Souls' Desire
by artisanrox
Summary: Yuffie causes a bunch of trouble for the newly engaged couple.  Continuation of my ooooooold fanfic, A Ring from the Storm, with much less bad, so I think.  Story would have stayed on my site were it not for Verizon's change in their TOS.
1. Chapter 1

Author's Note: This story, I think, has much less suck than Ring from the Storm. I actually like how Yuffie turned out in this one.

This was still written waaaaay before _Advent Children_ (yes, that's how old it is), as I was a frustrated FFVII fan with no where else to turn but fanfiction. Could you blame me? ^_^

This story is over 10 years old, and is here more for archive purposes than anything else, as fanfiction in XHTML isn't much fun, and having it here is just sooooo much less messy than having it on my website in case I need to hunt down a new webhost.

**Souls' Desire**

Chapter 1.

"Uh, actually...Ah'd kinda like to do child welfare," said Barret.

"Really, Barret?" Tifa asked with an amused smile on her face as she turned to him across the room.

"Hell, yeah! Takin' care of Marlene now since we got back from that crater for the second time really opened my eyes. I've really never had it so good. Kinda makes me feel really guilty for duckin' out on her for the last coupla years."

"Well, now that you can spend some time with her, you two can catch up! But don't call it 'ducking out'." Tifa giggled. She was thrilled that Cloud, her fiancee, had finally accepted the post of President-"or whatever," as he called it, and was now forming his forces from the little team that had rescued the Planet, plus a couple other folks they had met along the way. Cid thought it would be great to have a meeting to assign responsibilities, but since the Shinra tower was completely levelled by Diamond Weapon last year, discussing business there was obviously out of the question-especially to Cloud. It was hard enough for him to deal with his new position, let alone enter their old HQ.

So here they all sat for the third hour, on the top level of the completed Cloud Nine Bar. It was a small room, as Tifa never intended for it to be converted into an office space. The furniture was brand new. Little knick-knacks that Tifa had collected over time from the team's various travels, and also those given to her by Cloud, lined the oak shelves in the living room. Their small bedroom and a little washroom lay off to the side.

Tifa looked around the crowded room. Barret sat on the opposite couch from Tifa, leaning forward as he eyed the paperwork on the desk between them that he'd rather not even think about.

The big man was really starting to look a lot less ominous these days, as Marlene really mellowed him out. She chuckled again inwardly. They actually mellowed _each other_ out. He had traded his gun-arm yesterday for a brand new artificial arm. He had heard of a certain man named Ken Mishima owning such an arm, and immediately began to search out more information about it. Finding Mishima's own doctor, he was soon fitted with a more _natural_ prosthesis than his Missing Score. Not that he didn't keep his favored weapon in reserve, though. She guessed he just didn't want to scare the children away when he started his duties.

Vincent stood in back of him with his arms crossed in front of his chest, a little separate from the rest of the group, but nonetheless interested in the conversation. Even though he looked a lot less spooky now, sporting a relic Turk suit and a short, neat haircut for his jet-black hair, all knew he could never quite get over the loss of his Lucrecia.

The helpful scientist Bill Triniman was also present; he, after all, was the one who came up with the brilliant idea of Cloud as President. He was usually dressed in a neat shirt, tie, and dress slacks, and for the most part kept quiet during the meeting; his area of expertise was researching the best ways to safely clean up the mess at the Sector 7 repair project.

The three men aside of him, Jed, Luke, and David, all had fighting and spy skills that could be important for a new leader to expedite. The trio had been prominent figures in the Shinra military before AVALANCHE had toppled the system, and at first were a little hesitant to meet again the once lowly escort guard Cloud at first. However, since meeting him, and hearing what he went through for the past three years, they found a new respect for him. Had they known three years ago it would come to this point, they would have laughed until their sides hurt.

Nanaki scratched behind his ear once in a while as he sat next to the sofa Barret was seated upon. He had been PHSed to come back to Midgar to offer help for Cloud. He declined a position, mostly because he had his own Cosmo Canyon to take care of, but still arrived for the meeting to know what was going on and to show support for the new President, and to offer the help of his people in emergencies whenever they arose.

Only three invited were not present-Cid, who had taken the liberty of a smoke break outside, Cait Sith, who was in the shop at the Gold Saucer for repairs-something about fixing his fortune telling device-and Yuffie Kisaragi, who had flatout refused Cloud's offer to come to the meeting, besides threatening Midgar with another strike from her hometown of Wutai if Cloud "didn't produce his Materia immediately"...well, she was another entirely different story, one none really took all that seriously.

"Are-are you sure, Barret?" Cloud asked in his usually hesitant, disbelieving way. Tifa turned her head toward him and studied his face as he sat closely next to her on the new couch across the table from Barret. They had held hands lightly throughout the meeting, much to Barret's feigned annoyance for "bein' so damn _cute_". She thought he looked real good in his white Oxford shirt and close fitting denim jeans that left nothing to the imagination. Tifa was quite pleased she made him wear this. She thought back to earlier in the day, when she had "helped" him roll up his sleeves and undo the top few buttons of his shirt before the meeting, since "he was sooooooo hot and nervous". She giggled again and fixed her white tank top and flared-leg denim jeans just to keep her hands busy.

"Well, why not, ya spikey-hair-kid?"

"OK, fine," Cloud sighed as he rolled his eyes away from the big man. He was really doing a good job of not arguing with Barret in front of Tifa when the big guy let something distasteful loose. She hadn't appreciated that too much in the past, and Tifa threatened action if they ever argued. Barret didn't want to be kicked out of the bar by a gang of bouncers on his next visit, and Cloud REALLY didn't want to sleep on the couch...alone.

"Um...next on the agenda," he continued as he nervously scratched the back of his head, "we need to start some kind of recruitment for protection forces...for an army. Any ideas?"

"Put up real big #$%^ signs with messages like 'Strife Electric Company needs YOU!' 'SEC-The best job you'll ever love!' %^$*." Cid loudly suggested as he came back into the room after his smokebreak.

"Dang, man, I think those are taken already, ya doof." Barret said.

Cid innocently shrugged his shoulders. "By who?"

"Wait a minute... Did you say, 'Strife Electric Company'?" asked Cloud with lowered brows.

"Yeah, kid!" Cid answered as he gestured with his half-smoked ciggy in his hand. "That #$% SEC that's spraypainted on almost everydamnthing's gotta mean that since you're the man now, huh?"

"Well, I don't want it to mean that. No, really...this...this is the bottom line for this. I'd like this to be known as the Midgar Electric Company. It IS all of us, not just me."

A low grumble throughout the room answered his question. Tifa unlocked her hand from his and gave his thigh an encouraging rub, smiling warmly. He felt it and smiled back at her. She took his hand again.

"Sounds good, kid. Whatever you say."

"And don't say stuff like that! That scares me more than anything!" Cloud gasped with wide eyes.

"About the recruitment..." Vincent started as he stepped forward. "I could take Jed, Luke, and David with me to find some old members of Shinra...those in good positions when it collapsed...maybe they'll join us, too."

"Good. Do so, Vincent." Cloud rubbed his tired eyes from the three-hour meeting. "another imprtant thing...If anything happens to me, Cid, you're the man."

Tifa gave an audible whimper from aside Cloud.

"Um..." he glanced back at Tifa's whimper for a second, then snapped his head back. "Like I said, if anything happens to me, Cid, you're it."

"Thanks for the vote of confidence, kid."

"I think...we should stop here before our brains stop working...We'll meet again."

"Sure, kiddo. We'll be back." Cid started toward the door. turning back, he waved an arm towards the door. "And if anyone wants a coupla drinks on me, follow me down to the bar!"

"I'm with you!" said Triniman.

"My pleasure, Cloud. May you be pleasantly surprised at your new position." With that Vincent stepped out of the room along with Jed, Triniman, Luke, and David to start their work.

Nanaki added, "PHS us anytime if you need assisstance, Cloud...or should I say, President?" If Nanaki could grin, he'd be doing it now.

"Sure." Cloud and Tifa got up from the couch as the crew filtered out of the room.

As the last comrade left, the door shut and all was quiet. Cloud rubbed his eyes with his stiff hands. "Phew. Three hours."

"And finally, we're ALONE!" Tifa half-squealed, and threw her arms around her fiancee's neck.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2.

"Finally, finally, finally..." Tifa breathlessly sighed as she took Cloud's jaw in her hands and planted light kisses all over his face inbetween words.

Cloud snickered helplessly through the assault of kisses Tifa rained on him. "I didn't know you were looking foward to it that much, *mmmmm*-!" His words were cut off as Tifa placed a long kiss right on his mouth.

When she had had her fill for the time being, she broke the kiss and breathlessly asked, "So, Prez...what's your next move?"

"My next move?" he sad as he gave a cockeyed smile. "Maybe this...?" Tifa felt a hand slide up the back of her leg.

She giggled and took a hold of his roaming hand. "No, Cloud. I mean...with your little empire you have here?"

The smile suddenly disappeared from Cloud's face. Tifa could've compared it to the sun being overridden by a torrent of rain.

Tifa slid her hands up Cloud's chest, her head lowered in embarrassment. "I'm sorry...I know how seriously you take this...I was just..."

Cloud set his chin on her head and closed his eyes when she trailed off. She could feel and hear a long breath inward, then a heavy sigh. Cloud did consider his position of the utmost importance. Next to Tifa, of course.

He could just feel the weight of all the responsibility creep up on himself again with Tifa's mention of it. He wanted to make an effort to the people that he was most definitely not like any member of the short-lived Shinra dynasty that came before him. He most of all desired the people's respect, and was bent on any means to prove himself a worthy leader. The past three days were spent doing just that. He had his small team work on the Sector 7 plate project on Tifa's suggestion to make himself more visible as a leader. Barret, Cid, Tifa, and the rest of the men all made an effort to show the people that Cloud was their boss-and a damn good one at that.

It was slowly working. Most of the time, curious onlookers thought he actually was some sort of new governmental figure, and gladly joined in to help after meeting him personally. Cloud explained when approached that his organization, AVALANCHE, was together to help restore the Planet and also to bandage together the broken Midgar. It was up to Vincent and the rest of his crew now to finally win over those curious onlookers and consolidate the people into one strong force that once again believed in their President.

Cloud removed his chin from the top of her head after his long sigh and opened his glowing eyes. "That's alright. It's...just...a lot to think about." He tipped her head up to his face, with that crooked smirk again on one side of his mouth. "Although a little humor _could_ keep me out of trouble better!"

"A little of that and...a little of _this_!" She turned her back toward him and slyly bumped his leg with one of her hips.

He encircled her waist with his arms and started to lightly kiss her neck. He whispered into her ear. "I could use some refreshment after that meeting..."

"You mean...?" She craned her neck up to let him kiss it more.

He pulled away, laughing. "No... I mean...uh...like, water. I could use some water."

"Oh...sorry. You weren't very specific."

"_That's_ one thing you don't have to apologize for."

They made their way, smirking, over to the sink. Cloud opened the spigot and tested the water with his hand until it was cold enough to drink.

"You know about this Midgar water, Cloud. I hear they treat it with Mako. Maybe we shouldn't drink it."

"I'm sure _I'm_ the one that will be least affected by anything that's got that stuff in it."

"Ha! That's true. But this _is_ a brand new establishment. Maybe the water here won't be so bad. For now."

"True. Want some?" He offered the first glass he filled to his fiancee.

"Sure." She gratefully took it.

He filled his own glass and downed half of it right there. He then took hold of Tifa's hand and led her over to the couch. They sat together, on the same couch where Barret had sat just earlier. Cloud was surprised the springs weren't broken from the big man's weight. Slowing sipping their drinks, he flicked on the TV to scope what the wires had on that day and propped his feet up on the table.

Tifa fiddled with her glass nervously and put it down on the table in front of them. She undid her shoes and brought her feet up, tucking them together on the couch. She leaned her head on Cloud's chest and played with the four or five buttons that stubbornly remained closed on his shirt.

Silence and peace calmly coexisted for a long while, Cloud taking a sip once in a while, Tifa slowly finishing her own drink while Cloud manned the remote control.

Tifa's brow suddenly furrowed. "Cloud."

"Yes?"

"Do you...ever think about...your family at all?"

She could feel him move uncomfortably as she played with his shirt. "Not...very often. It's kind of tough to say."

"I do remember your mom, at least a little bit. She was a real go-getter."

Cloud's muscles tensed with the subject of the conversation.

She didn't even have to look at him to know this was a difficult subject. "Cloud, relax...I was just asking. You don't have to say anything if you don't want to. You just...never finished describing her when you told your story at Kalm a while back. I was curious to know more ever since then. And we've both been so preoccupied..."

"Yes...she was...very opinionated."

Tifa's mouth broke into a broad smile Cloud couldn't see. "Yeah...she went so far as to interrupt the mayor in his re-election speech once! Stepped right up to the podium and went on about how thrilled she was right in the middle of it!"

Cloud rolled his eyes and rubbed his now aching head at the painful memory. "She was really into politics. It ruled her life; she lived and breathed it. She was a nonstop engine when it came to accomplishing bigger and better things. The more exposure she got in the spotlight, the more she thrived. She thought I would be the same when I entered the military. She _knew_ I would accomplish the impossible and work wonders the moment I stepped into Midgar."

"Gee...no pressure there."

A long sigh preceded his response. "...yeah."

"You're...not really like her."

"Yeah, she told me that."

"Did she ever tell you about your father? I don't remember him at all."

"A little. She was always mentioning how much like him I was. She told me he was a quiet man, really in toward himself. She said he had a real strong sense of duty."

"Did they love each other?"

"I...don't know. She really didn't seem to take it hard when he died. She loved when all her society friends gave their condolences."

"How did he die?"

"Fell off a ladder while washing one of the front windows in the summer. Broke his neck. Instant death. Nothing worked to bring him back."

She turned her head towards Cloud with a terrified, shocked expression. "That's terrible!"

"..." Cloud began to stroke Tifa's long hair. "How about your mother? I remember the day she died. What was wrong with her? She seemed to be sick for quite a while."

Tifa laid her head back on Cloud's chest, the shirt now pulled apart in front from Tifa playing with the buttons. She rubbed his chest.

"She...was sick for a long time. An incurable infection she caught from tainted food spread throughout her body. She was so strong. A strong, loving woman up until the second she died." She nuzzled closer to Cloud. She blinked away a set of tears. She knew they were coming. "I miss her...and Papa..."

Cloud could hear her sniffing. He wrapped his arm without the drink in it around her shoulders and gave them a compassionate squeeze. That made her lose it.

She buried her face in his shirt. "I miss them, Cloud...I miss them so badly..."

"I'm...sorry...maybe I shouldn't have mentioned it." He stroked her hair as she sniffed in the tears.

"That's alright." She looked up at him again and grinned through her tears. "I did bring up the conversation, didn't I?"

"Yeah. I...just think there's a lot of things that happened to us that we didn't have the time to sort out, yet."

"Yeah."

With that said, she laid her head down again and listened for his heartbeat. She could hear it _thump-thump_ strongly inside, and almost fell asleep as the sound relaxed her.

She snapped herself awake after a while. "Cloud..." she timidly started out, "...do you ever...think about starting a family, maybe?"

Cloud almost choked on his water. He swallowed what was left in his mouth hard. His eyes were wide open with terror at the thought.

"You mean...like...kids and stuff?"

"Yeah." She lifted herself off his chest and looked him straight in the face, her brown eyes obviously pleading. "I've really been holding this in for weeks...no...even longer than that...but I want to have a family. With you. I want YOUR kids. I want little Clouds and Tifas running around here-" she swung her shaking hand in a big arc around the room to illustrate her point. "-...I really do. It's been my...little secret dream. For a long time. I didn't want to say anything about it when you were poisoned...I...didn't want to worry you at the wrong time."

_Whoa._ That was the only word that managed to successfully squeeze itself from his spinning mind. He stared at the puppy-eyed Tifa sitting before him on the couch.

"I...love you," was all she said. She folded her hands and started to bite her lip.

_Whoa._

Cloud snapped out of his trance. Ever in denial, he proceeded to consider all the factors in their present relationship he considered...um...less than ideal.

"But we're not even married yet! We haven't even been officially engaged for a week!"

She just sat there quietly gazing, biting her lip.

"And...what if someone happens to...to you, or me? Like, what then?"

"..."

_God, her eyes are beautiful..._

"And what if...he or, uh, she...starts picking up grammar lessons from, like, Barret? Or God forbid, Cid Highwind?"

She still said nothing, but came closer to him and began to run her fingers softly through his thick blonde hair, down his neck, onto his chest.

_Whoa!_

"And...and I was just kidding when I said that stuff about the "time being right" and all! I swear!"

She started to hotly kiss his chest, up to his jaw, finally reaching his mouth. He could feel her breath lightly on his face.

And he returned it.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3.

The stocky, bearded, mustached Triniman accompanied the pilot down the staircase. The short, narrow, off-white stairwell was sealed off from the bar area by a heavy, maroonish wooden door, and it swung open easily, being brand new.

Cid opened the door and entered the bar area. Done in all maroon and black leather, it had a warm atmosphere to it, and the guests that would soon be arriving when the bar officially opened would be the finishing touch to the business.

The bar was composed of a rich dark wood, the chairs made of the same substance. The seats and backs of the chairs were trimmed in little brass studs, holding the black leather to the chair. Most of the stools and chairs in the bar were made for one occupant, but in each isolated corner there was a long bench that wrapped around the respective corner for larger groups of patrons.

"So how exactly did Tifa pay for all this?" asked Triniman.

"We split up our profits from our little three-year shindig with Sephiroth after we told that $%*# to go loo-loo. After three years, there was so much Gil left over when we brought it all outta the _Highwind_, I was shocked that the bottom deck of the airship didn't just drop out from all that weight. So we divvied it up and hit the road."

Reaching the bar, Triniman took a seat on one of the stools. He was shocked at the quality of materials the bar was made out of. "Did she end up with a lot left over? This is pretty high quality wood and leather."

"I don't think so. She squeezed every penny into making the Cloud Nine something better than what she had before... She loved that old dump, but I guess she wanted to give back to the community. Or some #$%^ like that." Cid produced a shaker and some bottles of liquid from under the counter. "What'll it be, butt?"

"Oh...I...I don't know...Something light. Like a Del Sol Sunspray."

"Good choice, my man! I'll have one, too. I'm too !#$ lazy ta get my own stuff outta here." Cid proceeded to mix various fruit juices with a touch of spirits to create their drinks. "Lemme tell ya, hangin' around Tifa for the past while has really opened my crusty eyes to a whole new way of lookin' at this stuff!"

Triniman laughed. Cid seemed like the type to want to learn every excruciating detail about things he was interested in. Much like himself, surprisingly. And since Tifa was a bar hostess from way back, she had a lot to teach.

"Seems Cloud has a lot on his mind. I hope I didn't get him into something he didn't want to do." Triniman was feeling a little guilty lately about suggesting Cloud as their new President. He hoped it wasn't too much pressure on the boy, especially after all his less-than-positive experiences with governmental figures.

"Nah..." The pilot shook the juice, ice and spirits together and dumped them in two sizeable glasses on the bar he brought out. "He's just always wound real $%^* tight. Has a hard time relaxing and taking it easy. I guess he'd actually be out of his element if he weren't doin' ^%*# like that."

"But I'm sure Miss Lockhart will show him the benefits of 'relaxing and taking it easy'!" Triniman suggested with a mischevious grin.

"Hah! If he doesn't give her a hard time about it!" Each man sipped his drink, Cid taking a slightly larger 'sip' than the scientist. He suddenly looked as if he was struck by lightning. Triniman could see the gears turning inside Cid's head.

"Hey, Bill...we should help him relax, too...somehow...," he trailed off.

"Um...shouldn't that be up to Tifa?"

Cid clunked his glass hard on the table and shot the scientist a reprimanding look. "NO, the #$%! I'm talking about throwing a party!"

"For what?"

Cid lowered his voice for once to let Triniman in on the big secret. "Well...he IS gettin' hitched in about four months, ain't?"

"Ahhhhhhh..." Each man rubbed his chin in thought. A bachelor party would be the perfect way for Cloud to relax now!

Cid suddenly straightened himself from behind the bar as another idea hit him. He pointed a finger at Triniman. "Y'know, I wonder what he's like when he's bombed!"

That made Triniman open his eyes wide in shock. "Cid Highwind!"

"No, really! I gotta say...in the long while I've known him, I never seen him sloshed. I think it'd be a barrel of laughs to see what he does!"

Triniman contemplated the thought of the young man's friend sporting the idea of getting him to the point of no return. At first, he thought it a little cruel. But Cloud WAS so worried about his new duties, it was surprising he didn't complain of ulcers. And Tifa so far was the only one to make him smile recently. He had already seen Cloud consistently fill his role brilliantly as a leader...he never yet, as he thought of it now, seen him as...well, to the elder Triniman...just being himself, being a kid.

The scientist returned a sly smile. "I'm sure he's a happy drunk. Count me in."

Cid clapped him hard on the shoulder, his nicotine-stained teeth in a broad grin. Triniman's drink almost spilled out of his hand from the blow. "Great...I'm so glad you _share my concern_! We'll get the boys together...all of 'em. I have a plan developing in my warped brain."

The two laughed again heartily and sipped (or downed, whichever the case may be,) their drinks.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4.

Nothing. Again. For another month.

Tifa couldn't believe it. She desperately wanted a child for herself and her fiancee. And nothing. For three months. Something had to be wrong with her. It should never take that long.

Why this, now? Everything was finally going well for Tifa. The bar had already been chosen by the local folk as the best hangout in Midgar. She hired a great crew of workers, some she already knew from the Seventh Heaven. She would soon wed the man she's loved and known ever since they were kids. Cloud and Barret were finally able to cool it in front of everyone. She was getting to see more of Marlene. And Yuffie was out of their hair.

She looked out the window in the kitchen behind the bar, washing a few glasses to keep herself busy while waiting for her fiancee to come back from working late at the Sector 7 project. He was paged by an unusually anxious Vincent about a large fire in Sector 2, one that he had a gut feeling was deliberately set. Cloud was to rush back to their place, meet Barret there, and rush with him back out to meet Vincent and the rest of the crew at the scene of the crisis. Tifa offered to take care of Marlene while Cloud and his crew were busy in Sector 2.

She knew Marlene wouldn't be a problem; she had taken care of her numerous times for Barret in the near and recent past, and it was obvious that the spunky, sharp-toungued little girl had become attached to her. She was thrilled when her daddy gave her to Tifa to take care of when he was called out to a household for a emergency or working with Cloud at Sector 7. Her daddy, really surprisingly, loved children, and would give anything to help set them right in Midgar again.

Marlene was another bright spot that made her forget about her and Cloud's problem. Forgetting helped her carry out a good act of convincing everyone that something wasn't wrong, with the exception of Cloud. He always picked up precisely on whether something was upsetting her. In situations like this, she wished he didn't have that ability, as she looked down from the window above the sink to the glasses she was washing. Her brows furrowed. She knew her attempts not to let Cloud catch on to how disappointed she actually was by the unsuccessful attempts at a child recently weren't working. She knew he would be crushed if he found out how dissappointed she was.

She always was wondering what the problem could be. The only thing she could think of was the accident when she was studying under Zangan. In the more advanced techniques he was teaching, one misplaced step could have resulted in terrrible consequences. Which it almost did for Tifa. After a particularly poorly-done aerial kick, she landed so hard on the ground she was rushed to a doctor. That accident has always haunted her for some reason; now she knew what it was.

She sniffed a little. She wiped away a tear from her cheek with the back of her forearm. That breaking her train of thought, she stood shocked as she watched it trickle onto her wet hand.

And then the doors to the kitchen swung wide open. A nine-year old with fiery red hair and big, beautiful black eyes ran into the room. Tifa saw the girl and quickly put down the glass she was cleaning. She wiped her hands in the towel on the cupboard on the side of the sink and crouched down to the girl's level.

The girl stopped dead in the doorway as they swung shut. She lifted up her arms as if summoning all the gods. "_I_ have arrived!"

"And you'll be in trouble with your daddy if you don't give me a hug!" Tifa laughed as she stretched out her arms. That made the little girl give a toothy smile and run into Tifa. Their arms wrapped around the other and they gave one another a big squeeze.

Big Barret followed suit, huffing and puffing after Marlene, the doors swinging wide open for him. "Man, Marlene, you gotta give this poor guy a break! I'm not as young as you, girl!"

Marlene and Tifa continued to hug until the door opened the third time. Cloud strode quickly into the room behind Barret. Tifa let go of Marlene and locked her eyes to Cloud's. Marlene then stood by her father.

Tifa rose from her crouch and went immediately over to Cloud. She took hold of both his hands and nuzzled his neck, giving it a little kiss. He answered by giving her lips a little smack with his own.

"Heard from Vincent?" Tifa asked the both of them.

"Yeah," Cloud answered. "I asked him to keep me up to date as we were dropping of Marlene. He says that the fire is out, and they found where it started from. It was actually from the electric fuse boxes outside the building."

"How did it start?"

"There seems to have been a packet with some kind of highly volatile substance planted by the fuses. Something was obviously skillfully thrown from a good distance away to detonate it."

"And the worst thing about it, girl," Barret continued for him, "was that it was a shuriken!"

"A shuriken." Tifa said in comprehension to what they were saying. The only place where those taught how to use shurikens are from could be-

"Wutai." Cloud's expression darkened.

"Yeah!" fumed Barret. "Whatever punk set off that blaze _wanted_ us to find that piece a' metal! It's got their official crest on it and everythin'!"

Tifa's eyes opened wide in shock. "But that's so _arrogant_!"

"Yeah. That's Wutai."

"Cloud, you've been getting threats from there about handing over the materia! I think it's time we took Wutai seriously!"

Cloud shrugged his shoulders. "But...it's not we have anything to give them..."

Barret crossed his big arms. "Yo, punk, the girl's right. They don't know that. And, they'll able an' willin' to do anything if they even _think_ we got some."

Cloud shot his eyes at Barret as the word "punk" left his lips. He took a deep breath. He then turned to Tifa again. "Yeah. Unfortunately, they are. It was my fault that I this happened...I didn't take it seriously the first time."

"It was _all_ our faults. God." Tifa was genuinely worried. Wutai was dangerous in the past, and just because it hasn't been causing any tremors recently didn't mean it was dead. "Cloud, I think we should postpone the wedding."

"But Tifa...!" That was the last thing he expected to hear!

"Cloud, I don't want that ninja girl ruining our wedding! Which is more than in her power to do!"

Cloud had to pause for a while. He indulged in his habit of scratching the back of his head nervously. "Are you sure...?"

"I don't want anything to ruin it. Not her, not anyone." She leaned into him and played with his shirt collar. "We've waited too long for that."

He gazed into her eyes. Well, if we've waited this long... "OK, then...I'll spread the word."

"You're not gettin' married yet?" Marlene asked from under her father's shadow.

Tifa crouched down to Marlene again. "No, honey...Cloud has some real important things to straighten out before that."

"That means I won't get to dance at your wedding!"

"Better to do a little work now, so we can have a lot of _fun_ later!" She laughed and tickled Marlene enough to make her laugh, too.

"Marlene, we bedda leave Cloud and Tifa alone for a little. I'll take you upstairs for Tifa."

"Cool!"

With that, Marlene sprinted out, the doors swinging open the opposite way as they arrived.

"Wait a minute, girl!" Barret galumphed along after the little girl.

Tifa just laughed, and melted into Cloud's arms. She could always feel how warm he was when he held her. She kissed him hot and long on the lips until she felt him break it.

"Before we get any further..." Cloud stated as he looked at her face sternly.

"Yes, hun?"

He brought her face closer to his with his fingers under her chin. He wiped just underneath her left eye with the back of a finger. "What's this?"

Oh. Her eyes must have still been a bit red. "Um...it's...it's..."

"It's our problem again, huh?"

Tifa lowered her eyes. She nodded yes. "I want one so badly. There's something wrong...I know there is..."

"Well, _I'm_ sure there isn't!" he declared. He suavely stroked his fingers down her neck and onto her chest. "How do you know I'm not teasing you?"

Tifa let out a girlish giggle that would've made Aeris envious. Her smile quickly disappeared. "I think it's me..that accident I was in...it has to be me."

"Nah...I just think it wasn't meant to be just yet. Relax."

"I want to get looked at...I really do."

"Well, if you do, I will too. Just to show you that it's _fine_. Really...It'll be fine! Chill!" He didn't like the idea of being poked and prodded again by scientists, but this was different. This was for her.

She smiled. "Alright. I will. We both will. Like you said...I'm sure it's fine..." She looked away as her thoughts consumed her for a minute, then looked into his eyes again. "Maybe I'm trying too hard."

He held her tighter and whispered in her ear. "That's fine with me."

She playfully smacked his shoulder, giggling, and broke herself away from him. "Come on, Loverboy, let's go get you on the road."

They left through the swinging doors to head upstairs where Barret and Marlene waited.


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5.

With Marlene safely in Tifa's care, Barret and Cloud left the bar to head toward the scene of the crime. Barret was getting into the habit of nonstop fuming about Wutai, its inhabitants, and the less-than-ideal methods the ninjas of the town used to obtain what they wanted. Now that he was away from Marlene, he continued to curse the town left and right until Cloud's ears burned. Until now, it was thought only Cid could do that.

"What kinda place they hit?" Barret finally asked, now a little more calmly, after cooling down in the silence after his verbal rampage. Seemed that now he and Cloud were on their way, it helped him feel like they were getting somewhere in solving the problem.

"Old warehouse." Cloud curtly replied to him, and felt he needed to say no more. This was no time for chatting.

Barret's ire rose again. He turned toward Cloud with a deep grimace on his face. "Well, damn, I coulda watched the damn news and heard that!"

Cloud's brow was deeply furrowed, but his eyes were ice cold as he stubbornly kept his head forward. _Great place to cause trouble, Wallace_, thought Cloud as he snapped back, "Well, _that's_ all you asked me!"

"Well, ya couldn't be a little less specific, could ya? I mean, anyone die, anyone hurt? Any homes around the target? Everyone allri-"

"Rowhomes," Cloud interrupted. "There...were some rowhomes around the warehouse." Cloud continued on with a little less venom in his answer. "No one was hurt, thankfully. The fire was contained before any structural damage was done to the homes."

"Damn Wutai. Yuffie's got a dig in this. Damn ninja girl wants that materia stuff, anyway she can git it."

Cloud's only reaction to this newest fume was stony silence. Finally he had to force something out. "I think that's pretty obvious."

Barret almost spit, he was so worked up now. He turned to Cloud again but was only met with the young man's profile. "I thought the trip over to that fire site would be a lil' _chilly_ with you around. Betcha you coulda put it out yourself with all that ice ya got."

That stopped Cloud dead from fury, and the duo's walk ground to a halt. He took his cocky stance of on hand on his hip, pushing a finger into the big man's meaty chest, finally meeting Barret's dark orbs with his own. Barret thought that "funky glow" in Cloud's eyes made him look even more pissed than usual in the dimming twilight. "_Look_, man, I didn't think this was gonna be any easier. You need to cool your jets or I'll...I'll..."

Barret always managed to be stunned when Cloud's anger matched his. Even though Barret was many times Cloud's stature, he was always driven to silence when the boy showed he had had enough. Everyone else in AVALANCHE had just cowered when Barret tried to throw his hulking weight around. Excepting Tifa, of course.

Cloud suddenly was at a loss for words. He looked away, taking in a deep breath. He looked up at Barret, almost as if he was begging for something. "Tifa, man."

Barret's face melted at the word. He joined his friend in hanging his head in shame. "Yeah. Tifa. Guess we gotta focus on why we here and what we doin'. Ain't gonna get us nowhere to get huffy now."

The young man was the first to step off, again without a word. Barret studied the concrete beneath his feet in thought, and then rushed to catch up with his friend.

"Yo! Yo wait, man!" Cloud could hear the big man huffing and puffing to catch up. He finally reached the side of his friend's shoulder as Cloud quickly walked, almost jogged, steadily towards the site. "Yo, Tifa...she...she didn't look real happy in there before I took Marlene up...whassup wit dat?"

"..." Cloud darted his eyes for the slightest instant toward Barret, but kept his face forward so the glance wasn't seen. He thought better of his attitude for a moment as he asked a question that had been bothering him for months.

"Barret...what...what's taking care of Marlene like?"

Barret stopped walking for a second, shocked at such an unusual question. But when Cloud didn't reciprocate the urge to stop also, he again hunkered quickly to catch up with Cloud.

"Marlene? She's my everythin'. She's the reason I'm doin' what I'm doin right now. Weren't for her, I couldn't 've fought as much as I did. I'd be probably torn to bits lyin' in some hole with bullets in my body without her. Takin' care of her, now that I actually do," he took a pause that betrayed his long-laden guilt about his less-than-perfect record of taking care of the girl, "I can say I'm the happiest man in the world."

Cloud's brow was...well...extremely clouded at this point. He looked up at Barret timidly, but with a hint of curiosity. "Really?"

"Yeah! I was fightin for the Planet, for my friends...for her. I always thought of her whenever I wuz stuck in some jam. I said to myself, 'I gotta get outta this damn problem I'm in so I'll see her again!' and it always worked. Whenever I was stuck. On anything...fighting or otherwise." He was smiling through the whole speech. Until he realized he had previously asked a question himself. "Well, you gonna answer my question or not? Got some problem with it?"

Cloud let out a long sigh in frustration of his problem with Tifa and his present company. He would never bring the main problem between himself and Tifa, especially to "another guy", so he brought up another. "She...really wants a kid...and I'm..not that great with kids."

Barret let out the biggest bellylaugh Cloud had ever heard the big man let loose. He turned again to Cloud as he tried to say inbetween laughs, "So you all chicken 'bout havin' a little tyke? Ha ha ha! Dat's all?"

"I am NOT chicken!" snapped Cloud furiously.

That made Barret's laughter immediately stop. "Whoa. Sorry. Well...I know you haven't had the pleasure of havin' a little one around. Except for Marlene."

"Yeah." This time it was Cloud's turn to try and cool it.

"I'm tellin' ya! It's not easy at first! I didn't have a clue to start, either. But you eventually get...kinda caught up in it...the parent thang, that is...and then you wonder how you ever did without it. Damn...nine years ago. God, how she changed me. Couldn't even begin to think what kinda person I was nine years ago when Marlene first popped into my life."

Cloud shuddered within himself. Neither could he.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6.

"It'll take a few more moments for the doctor to finish with his last patient. If you like, you can wait in the adjoining room for him." The secretary gave each of them a glance as they each silently studied the other's face for an idea of how to kill the time.

"So?" Tifa asked Cloud hesitatingly, arms folded, leaning on the high counter that separated them from the receptionist.

"I really don't just want to sit around and wait. Can we go to the gift shop or something?"

She let out a stiff sigh. She was anxious to hear the results of the tests, too. "OK. Fine." She turned her head to the receptionist of the medical building. "We'll just take a short walk and check back later."

"Alright, Miss Lockhart. See you in a few minutes."

Tifa gently took hold of her man's sleeve cuff and guided him away from the spacious desk. She wrapped her arm as usual inside his as they walked toward the elevator.

A stuffy feeling surrounded them. Usually, the two of them found peace in each other's silence, but this situation was different. The new, uncomfortable aura that surrounded them for the past few weeks was more evident now than ever. And each had their own reasons for it.

The series of tests to find out their chances of having a child together were, in Cloud's opinion, extremely embarrasing. If it weren't for Tifa, he wouldn't be within ten miles of this facility. He absolutely knew nothing was wrong...he was more than aware of the impact that strong emotional upheaval had on a couple. The past few months, with worrying about his new position as President, where to find supporters, and Wutai's constant threats and fire attacks on Midgar were more than enough to occupy most of Cloud's time. All these together had a severe straining effect on his relationship with Tifa, and the stress of not seeing each other often was the root cause of their problem. It was that simple.

Cloud noticed her tendency to get more agitated every day as the appointment got closer and closer. Tifa didn't care how uncomfortable the tests had been; she seemed relieved that they were performed. She desperately wanted a family with Cloud, and only saw them as a means to an end. What if the problem did lay with her? She had always tried to mentally prepare herself for the worst when it came to battles. The past four years had really drilled the basics into her head. Check your materia to see how far your attack and protection magic will take you. Carry lots of extra potions and Phoenix downs in case the majority of these important items were duds...which they were. Warm up your muscles and joints before doing any aerobic work so you won't be biting the dust after the monsters wear you out. Tifa was thrilled when she knew a challenge lay waiting for her the next day when it was time to sleep, as all this experience rolled around in her mind.

However, this was not a battle. This was family. Her whole future, as she considered it. Adoption just wasn't the same. Not that she wouldn't adopt in an instant, but it...just wasn't the same to her...it wasn't her and Cloud.

She felt an arm gently press agains her back, urging her out of the elevator. She jumped at the surprising sight of the sign above the elevator door, _2nd Floor_, before her-the floor with the gift shop, to which they had just arrived. She never even heard the hiss of the door open. Cloud gave her his typical, amused boyish smirk as she snapped out of her absent-mindedness. She gazed into his glowing blue eyes and smiled back. _I hope he...or she... has that smile_, she thought.

They stepped out of the silverish, metal-encased elevator into the white, white hall, hands interlocked. They rounded the corner, and the beautiful sprays of flowers and greeting cards in the display windows gave away the gift shop's position. Little bells tinkled as Cloud swung open the glass door and let his girl inside first.

"Are they imported from somewhere?" Tifa asked herself out loud as she headed straight for the flower arrangements. Cloud followed. He watched her take a petal inbetween her fingers. "Nope...silk."

"Artificial," Cloud added. "Seems all of them are artificial."

"Yeah." Tifa finished. She took a long sweep of the store when her eyes caught something even better. "Oh, Cloud, LOOK!" She released his hand and started jogging toward a far wall...where huge, furry stuffed animals were shelved in the wall. Cloud rolled his eyes, smirked again, and followed once again, avoiding the various tables and displays set up within the store.

She instantly geabbed the furriest thing she could find...a huge stuffed brown dog. She showed it to Cloud, then cuddling it as if it were her own childhood toy. "Isn't it adorable?" Cloud almost lost his breath as how cute she was as she squeezed the toy.

"I could just take it home right now!" She held it out at arm's length, looking into it's dark, beaded eyes. Then she gave it a little peck on the forehead. "Look at that face!" Breaking into a giddy laugh, she held it close again as she noticed Cloud's crossed arms.

"What?" She asked him, snickering.

Cloud put one hand on a hip and pointed at the animl with the other. "Lucky dog."

Tifa blushed a deep crimson. Then she played along. "Oh? Are we jealous?" she asked out of the corner of her eye as she rearranged the dog's fur.

"No...just...hoping that that dog appreciates who just kissed it."

"Oh, Cloud...REALLY." She held the animal's face an inch away from Cloud's nose. "Don't you just wanna give it a peck?"

Cloud laughed, then leaned toward the animal. His head darted around it, and Tifa's lips suddenly felt Cloud's warm mouth on them.

Cloud pulled away, a faked apologetic gleam in his eyes. "Oops. I missed."

They laughed out loud as Tifa placed the dog back on the shelf in front of her, and they started again to browse the aisles, hand in hand.

"So...when...when are we gonna get married?" Cloud suddenly asked.

Tifa let out a sigh of frustration. There were so many things going on now...It wasn't that she was afraid of commitment, it was just that she was afraid that such an event would provoke an unwelcome reaction from Yuffie. "I don't know...do you think she'll be a problem a year from now?"

"I don't think she'll be a problem a week from now."

"In any case, I don't want her ruining anything. Let's just give ourselves another year. By that time, we'll have an army together to send over there and nail them!"

"Now hold on, Tifa...no army of mine is 'nailing' anyone until we know what their motive is for doing this. Besides, an army that needs to fight in daylight will be useless against what Wutai has."

"And that means?"

"Wutai can send hitmen to lurk in the shadows. They're very elusive and very wily. It would be simple for Godo to just send an assassin over."

"This is true." Tifa was starting to appreciate Cloud's caution in dealing with Yuffie and her father.

"They've caused so much destruction even without an army. And they refuse to tell us why they're doing so."

Tifa heaved another sigh. "A year from now it is...again. And until then, we need to be really careful."

"Yeah."

"But when we DO get married, I'm gonna make sure I whisk you away to some exotic resort...better than Costa del Sol!" Cloud excitedly said as his face brightened. "We'll dance, we'll eat and drink, we'll...well...you know...," he trailed off as some elder customers happened to wander within earshot of his words.

"We'll what?" Tifa pried, not-so-innocently.

Cloud had just opened his mouth when the announcement began. _"Would T. Lockhart and C. Strife, please go to the first floor reception desk. Again, would T. Lockhart and C. Strife, please go to the first floor reception desk. Thank you."_

They were startled by hearing their own names on the com system. Cloud realized the doctor was probably waiting for them by now. "Uh-oh...I guess we killed enough time."

They quickly walked toward the elevators, that dark, terrible shroud threatening once again to enclose around them.


	7. Chapter 7

Chapter 7.

"...Would...would you want...me to drive...home?"

"..."

She didn't touch him. Instead, she leaned a little closer, through her own hot tears, and tried to peer through the hands that shielded his face. It didn't work. They were clenched too tightly, and his mane of hair only helped to prevent her from seeing in. "I think I should drive home. Would...you like me to?"

"..." He lifted his head a little from him hands, eyes nailed to the floor in disbelief, and eyelids red. They made his glowing blue eyes stand out more,and almost vibrate as her wet eys tried to adjust to both oppositely contrasting colors at once. He let out a long, long breath through his fingers.

She wanted to brush the blonde hair away from his face a little, so to have him make eye contact. But...something stopped it. This just wasn't the right time for that. Ususally she would just squeeze the life out of him in a death-hug leadibng up to an impassioned kiss, but not now. This was..a different problem. This was one of those "us" problems. Not the first they've ever had, but definitely the one with the most potential to destroy a lot of what they have built up.

"Let's...go home, Cloud. We need to...get out of here." She wasn't sure she would be able to drive home, either. She wasn't sure what she wanted.

They had ended up just sitting there in silence, one on each chair of the doctor's private office. The words he spoke still thundered through her head. She knew it was her when the doctor's expression was grim. However, it seemed he had been through things like this before, and a practiced detachment was also evident in his tone.

_"Well, I will begin by saying the results are in. Miss Lockhart-"  
>Thank God he's holding my hand...<br>"The tests show you are 100 percent healthy. We-"  
>"YEAH!" He had given her such a victorious, boyish I-told-you-so smile. He had squeezed her hand tighter.<br>"See!"  
>Wait...he wasn't finished speaking..."Cloud, wait a minute...", she hushed him.<br>"Oh...sorry."  
>The doctor continued. "As I said, Miss Lockhart, you are in the clear. Mr. Strife-"<br>"'Cloud'! Just call me 'Cloud' already!"  
>He gave a small, forced smile. "Alright. Cloud..."<br>Glancing down at the paper on his desk, he sighed.  
>"Cloud, I'm...very sorry." <em>

The next several minutes was spent pleading, weeping, questioning...the doctor had seen it all before. But Mako exposure was never the reason. No matter how many times he demanded for the doctor to run the tests again, it was decided. The tests were already been run through three times. And all pointed in the same direction. Mako exposition. After the room was left silent again, the doctor excused himself...to leave the young couple sort this out as only they could do alone.

And so, she got up abruptly from the chair. Went immediately to the door. Had to just...get out. "Let's go...I...I want to go home." Hand on the doorknob, she added, "...please." She felt so...dirty and guilty. That was the only way to describe it. Dirty and guilty because that, in making such a big deal of her accident in the past, it was completely overlooked in her mind that Cloud was also a probable cause.

He didn't move. He slid his hands down into the palms of his hands again. Tifa didn't know whether to be more crushed at the results of the tests she herself begged for or Cloud's reaction to them. She walked back to the chair on she had previously sat when she saw his inaction. Sitting herself down again in the chair, she covered her mouth with her folded hands, elbows on knees. Gazing at the top of his head, she finally found some hopefully encouraging words.

"Cloud...we've been through everything. Fire, death, betrayal, a madman, the possible destruction of the entire Planet...we can get through this. We can find a way. I...I am so sorry for my behavior the past couple weeks...maybe we...can keep trying...maybe they're wrong..."

"...Wrong." The only word he had spoken in twenty minutes. Angrily forced out between clenched teeth, he purposely chose the most useless word in her futile speech. Another sigh followed by the single word. "Wrong," again he said, this time in a whisper.

Cloud rose from the chair and headed toward the door, his fiance in tow. They exited the room in silence and made their way to the desk for Cloud to pay the bill. It further irked him to know he actually had to pay for this. Not that he wanted Tifa to pay, it just was another slap in the face to his already humiliated ego.

Tifa wanted them to have a child so badly, and Cloud was unable to give that most precious, singular, life-changing gift to his love And all he kept thinking about was her previous words that night-

_"...I want little Clouds and Tifas running around here...I want _your_ kids..."_

The way home was wrought with more silence. Cloud just leaned his head back in the passenger seat and kept his eyes shut as Tifa drove back to the Cloud Nine. The only thing that broke the stony silence was an occasional sigh from Tifa.

How to console him...and myself? she thought. "Cloud...we can get through this. We're young yet. There's no telling what can happen in even the next few months. Um..." her voice broke off as she searched for words. "Um...maybe for now we _should_ focus on just us...I mean...things have only begun to calm down in the last two weeks."

Cloud cracked open his red eyes.

"And...focusing on ourselves is good. We still don't know _really_ a lot about each other... We know about each other's motives when we were kids. And we know together about Sephiroth and Meteor... But... What do we know about all those important little things fiancees should know about each other? Like...um...favorite foods. Favorite TV shows. Favorite Gold Saucer games."

This is true. Cloud tried his damndest to stop a snicker at the last item in her list, but to no avail. The snicker just managed to crack through his exhausted face. Maybe she's right.

"Yeah..." she continued. "this...is maybe where we should be. Right now."

_Yeah_, he thought.

"And besides, Cloud...we...we can always adopt."

She HAD to bring it up again. Damn. He was just starting to feel better.


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8.

Vincent Valentine heavy-heartedly opened the door to the stairwell and climbed the stairs. They never seemed so long.

Vincent found himself practically flopping down on the living room chair. President Strife was there, glaring at him, waiting for his report on finding any help to start rebuilding the physical and moral cases of Midgar again.

_Wait a minute. *Glaring?* Hm. Maybe he's just tired,_ Vincent thought. _He looks so tired all the time..._

"Anything?" Cloud broke the silence with a jabbing question.

"No, sir."

Cloud sprang up irritated from his seat. Putting his hands in his pockets, he hefted himself over to the window and blankly peered out at nothing in particular. "Damn. This is pointless..."

"Sir..."

Cloud spun around, and his eyes were absolutely burning inside his head. _ What is UP with him? Vincent thought. Is it Tifa? He only gets like this when it's something to do with Tifa... _

"Yes?"

"Sir..." Vincent assessed the furious expression in Cloud's eyes speechlessly again, and after realizing his mind was wandering, started his evaluation of the Midgar people again. "Sir, my assessment of the mental mindset of this city is not necessarily that of hatred towards you, or any of us in particular, but a sort of restlessness. A sort of...emptiness, a longing for someone who can show the people their potential. A guide."

"Some have seen you as that, although this city is so overwhelmingly massive, we have been able to expose you to only a small portion of it. We will need to further canvass this city to let them know that Shinra is dead."

Cloud turned his head back to gaze at a bird that happened to light itself on a wire outside. "Shinra is dead...but Wutai is up to something..."

"Sir? You have encouraged us time and time again that Wutai is no threat. Do you really believe that?"

"Wutai as a whole is no threat, I believe. However they still retain powerful magicians. I'm not sure why they would go around destroying random empty buildings when they have so many powerful magicians in their country, though."

"Do you think us aiding Yuffie and Godo in the past has resulted in us shooting ourselves in the foot?"

Cloud really didn't care about Yuffie, or Godo, or Wutai, or his Presidency...not at this point. But there were too many people relying on him to be distracted by his personal problems.

"Yes."

Vincent was shocked that Cloud was so blunt with his reply.

"Oh, don't give me that crap, Dad, I know the Blonde Bomb's got something we want!"

"But dear. We are using tactics that the Shinobi clan would completely disagree with. They are disowning us as they live in Paradise. Let's just concentrate on our own home for once, dear. Shouldn't we have learned that lesson...?"

"Lesson! Chocoboshit on the lesson!" Yuffie let loose her giant shuriken on the helpless target dummy far across the sunny Wutai practice field. It was a perfect throw, AS usual. The dummy's stuffed head was easily separated from the rest of it as her shuriken siced through it.

"But dear...After all, he DID do something with all the materia...it seems all of it has...disintegrated!"

Her jet black hair blew into her face as the gentle breeze flowed in from the mountains high above Wutai, where the gods of Da-chao slept in stony silence. "Which is WHY I want him here. I want whatever he's got. I want that weapon and I want him with it, too. He's the only one that can use it. I was aboard that airship when that materia practically placed itself into the hilt of that sword. I think it still exists and it's important!"

"But using the gods themselves like playthings! We're using totally unnecessary methods!"

Yuffie managed to stop throwing the shuriken and level with her father. Just for a moment. "Daddy...," she began, helplessly looking for words to convince him. "Daddy...our people are happy. They are secure in your leadership. They're confident that the world isn't going to be blasted into smithereens by some falling rock from the sky. But daddy, they are not _proud_!" She gestured with her hands into a pleading gesture for the first time in her arrogant life. "Daddy, your people, OUR people, are not _proud_. They need desperatly to see your magic powers and those of the other magicians in the town. They need to be able to say to people," and she put a fist to her heart to emphasize her point, "'I am _Wutai_!' and see the respect and awe in that other person's eyes. Please, daddy, don't waste this opportunity. This is our last chance to go from a tourist city with a leader that noone realizes the powers of to a...city that knows where it's pride springs from!"

Godo considered her speech for a moment.

"Daddy, I think the gods of Da-Chao would forgive us. In fact, they would do more! They would _crown_ us! Crown us and Wutai as the great nation of warriors we should be regarded by the word as!"

Godo was about to buy into the theory.

"But we need that guy and his weapon and whatever that thing in his weapon is...for US. We need control over whatever he's got. Da-Chao will undoubtedly help us."

"Fine, dear. Do whatever you need to do. I put you in charge of the plan to bring that young man here."

Yuffie gave a sly smile with a glint in her eye after picking up her weapon again. "Ya sure, Pops?"

"Well, I won't last forever. You have to have some experience directing Wutai's actions. This is a start."

"Great! Daddy, you're pretty good for an old geezer!"

Godo was...errr...glad to recieve the compliment.

Yuffie threw her weapon a few more times as Godo left her to practice alone. _Yeah. He put me in charge to bring Strife over here. HA! _ She thought as she left the shuriken loose one last time at the nearly destroyed practice dummy. The shuriken sliced through the torso of the dummy and it fell limply to the ground in half.

"Put me in charge, he says!" she finally said out loud as she mocked her father to herself. "Ha, Daddy...what do you think I've been doing for the past couple months already?"


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter 9.

Cloud stared blankly out the window. The bird was gone. _Hm. Now that Shinra was gone, even the birds have returned..._

"So what you're saying, Vincent, is that you haven't come up with anything at all?"

"Absolutely not, sir! There..."

Vincent's words were cut off by Cloud abruptly leaving the window and almost throwing himself down on the chair opposite him. He put a hand to his glowing eyes and attempted to rub the sleep and worry out of them. Hm, not very effective.

Vincent was silent as Cloud took the hand away from his head and leaned back tiredly. He looked at Vincent for a long moment. He was actually smiling.

"You're a Turk, and you defer to call me 'sir'. I never understood that about you. You really don't have to call me 'sir, or anything else. No one else does," managing to chuckle at the words _no one_.

"I'll do what I see fit for the moment," answered his dark comrade with the gold claw underneath his navy blue business suit. "That is what a Turk is supposed to do. Very useful philosophy. I never forgot that."

Cloud was thoughtful.

"It's wise to defer to someone sensible, practical, caring. It's stupidity not to defer to anyone, or not use discernment when considering who to defer to. That was the mistake of Elena and the other Turks."

"Hm."

"So have you found anybody?"

"Yes. In fact I have. They are even gathered at a local inn, within walking distance, if you would like to meet them. They are intersted in hearing your plans for Midgar and the rest of the planet."

"Yes, absolutely...right now?"

"Yes. I will take you to them."

Vincent rose from his seat and Cloud followed. He looked hopeful for the first time in a while. Cloud showed him to the threshold out of the top floor of the Cloud Nine and they headed down the steps int Tifa's bar. It was well past closing time and everyone was out. The tables were immaculate, the glass sparkling and the wood a rich, newly polished brown. _Boy_, thought Cloud, _Tifa was way ahead of the game when it comes to this bar. She must be one strict boss to work for! I'd like to eavesdrop on her in the kitchen one of these days, when all this is over and we have a family..._ Then he couldn't help sighing. His thoughts would always come around full-circle to their problem. He just couldn't cut with her. _Tifa..._

The trip to the inn was overall a silent one, except for a couple questions about Tifa from Vincent, answered with curt replys from Cloud about not wanting to discuss it, or just occasional grunts in reply to his inquiries. Vincent accepted this from Cloud as naturally as Barret would be able to get him irritated. And although the other men wholeheartedly supported him as President of Midgar, he preferred Vincent's company especially in times like this for this reason. As distant as Vincent may seem, his cold exterior always hid his clarity and compassion under an icy shroud that became all the more clearer with more time spent with him.

Reaching the inn, only a few city blocks away, Cloud and Vincent surveyed the area. It didn't seem quite a prosperous section, but things seemed to be well in repair compared to the rest of the city. The inn looked almost too quiet. The windows were dark, and even the large lobby window that separated the inside from the street on which the duo stood was completely black. The only sign of life was one or two windows that the light shone out of on one of the higher floors above them to reveal that maybe there were one or two occupants inside. Cloud wondered if they were to meet other supporters there how could the whole building look so abandoned? _Maybe they're underground, in hiding?_ Cloud pondered.

Vincent was the first to reach the door latch, a rusty silver relic that gave away that this was a much wealthier area in the pre-Shinra era. Vincent pressed it down, and after a little resistance it clicked and let the two inside.

Cloud's escort was the first inside, also. He was obviously feeling like quite the bodyguard today, and although he knew Cloud could hold his own if there was a problem, it was all the better that Vincent took the most of the initial aggression should an enemy show up unexpectedly. The streetlights provided enough light to cast cold shadows on the ground in front of them, Vincent's form being much larger than Cloud's, as there was at least a few inches between them in height difference.

"I didn't want to bring you here without purpose, Cloud," stated Vincent in an unusual tone, almost as if he was reciting a line in a play.

Cloud didn't reply to the strange comment. He followed his comrade inside and stepped aside of him. _Way too dark and quiet in here._

"However, I do hope you enjoy your stay. There was a lot of effort put into this and we don't want to see you go home without having you feel guilty about putting aside your other important responsibilities for just one night."

_What!_ Cloud thought that that was exactly he came here for...for what Vincent led him to here for! _Is this a trap?_

All of a sudden, the lights in the whole building seemed to explode as they were flicked on! There was a shout and a holler of about twenty or twenty-five men as if they had just challenged Ruby Weapon and won. The whole room was decorated in red and black ribbon, and over at the bar was a chair with a deep purple velveteen throw blanket covering it. Almost every male that Cloud knew and recognized stared him in the face...all his old buddies from when he was a soldier, all the people he'd met along the way, and every guy that Vincent and Barret could find that would attend. There was a huge cake in the middle of the room, which looked suspiciously made of cardboard and tissue paper. Barret towered over the chair with the purple blanket holding a can of beer...and none other than Cid Highwind stood by the light switch with a beer in one hand and a chintsy, hastily-made golden foil crown in the other.

"HEY KID! Get the rest of your ass the hell in here and have a seat, we were gettin' irritated that you weren't gonna show. You're lucky, kid! Can't have a bachelor party with the Most Important Bachelor sittin' at home givin' himself an ulcer!"

Cloud stared. His glowing eyes popped out of his head...they were planning a _bachelor party_ the whole time! Cloud snapped out of his shock and finally found his voice to say, "But guys, the wedding...we had to delay-"

Cid ran so fast over to him the other men in the room thought he was going to hop over furniture so the pilot could prevent Cloud from completing the rest of his sentence. He had a look of mock fury on his face and as he reached Cloud, practically threw the beer in his hand and, after finding the paper and tin-foil crown was a bit too small to fit over Cloud's spiky hair, MADE the crown fit on his head.

"You know, I oughta smack ya! Siddown and relax for a bit...so it was delayed. That means that we can have another party when you set the REAL date, RIGHT BOYS?"

"YEAH!" the men cheered with one voice in reply to the Captain's call, and all lifted their glasses or cans to toast him. Cloud's face turned beet red as Cid's attention turned to the cake in the center, with the rest of the room following his eyes.

"Besides, you wouldn't want to miss this opportunity to meet Bunny, would ya?"

"Bunny...?"

The top center of the cardboard cake ripped open to reveal a spunky, voluptuous girl in red spandex and a maribou trim bra. Cloud's face turned a darker shade of red...

"Yeah, she's here just for a little, but hey...you're gonna be an old married fart soon, so just have a seat in your little throne here," as Cid dragged his poor victim by the shoulder over to the chair in front of Barret, "and have a few and relax! RIGHT BOYS?"

"CHEERS AND BEST WISHES TO OUR PRESIDENT!"

_ "YEAH!"_

"MAY HE ALWAYS HAVE THE BEST OF LUCK IN HIS NEW JOB!"

_ "YEAH!"_

"AND MAY HE ALWAYS HAVE A COUPLE A' GOOD LOOKIN' GIRLS AT HIS SIDE, TOO!"

_ "YEAH!"_

During the last round of cheer Cid couldn't help but lean over to Cloud and say underneath the din of the group of men, "Ya know I was just kidding about the last part don't ya? Don't repeat that to Tifa for her to get all mad at me, now..."

Bunny puckered her deep red lips and helped herself out of the cake from where she was hiding, slinking towards Cloud.

Cloud didn't know whether to turn darker red or just turn pure white.


	10. Chapter 10

Chapter 10.

Yuffie was finished putting her "Wonder of Wutai" special pore-cleansing mud mask and half-awakedly toddled away from her sink. Her bright, fuzzy green bathrobe was warm cmpared to the cool menthol of the mud mask on her face. Her hair in matching green curlers, she made her way out from behind the screen that separated her bed and bath area with the rest of the house. She made it a point for herself to remember that when she took over leadership of Wutai she was _definitely_ going to have to have "Lord Yuffie" embroidered on the back. In bright Yellow letters. Yeah. With gold spun from the Blonde Bomb's own gold chocobo. Yeah.

Yuffie let out an audible _urk_ing sound when the thought of Cloud crossed her mind. He's still got that materia. Her plan of action is going too slowly. Shake needed to be fired one of these days, he was causing too much trouble within the ranks. Da-chao was sleeping a little too peacefully for her taste. For now. And speaking of Shake, Shake was late. Where the hell was he? That little beady-eyed midget couldn't keep to a schedule if his life depende-

Yuffie rounded the corner of the screen and _there_ he was. He'd just gotten up from a mat on the floor and was adjusting his dark green vest. He was late again.

"You're up late, Yuffie."

Yuffie scowled. Alright, she thought as she looked at the clock, so it was eleven thirty. She tried to scowl her very, very best scowl and directed it toward Shake. Shake was not shaking. "Shut up, Shake." It was the very best insult she could come up with after just getting out of bed.

"Two of our men were caught by Midgar authorities under Strife's supporter's network, Yuffie."

"Go away, Shake."

"And Strife and his...shall we say..._cabinet_...know that we're building military forces, Yuffie."

"Go away till you have good news." Yuffie didn't want to hear it. She was spending a lot of her own time giving their meager military force some practical combat guidelines. She was determined for her plan to scare Strife into coming to Wutai to work. She was losing a lot of the country's best ninjas. And though they were competent, and managed to eventually escape and come back, it was getting harder and harder. Some who came back reported that the man known as Vincent Valentine was well aware of the tactics their ninjas might use and always had one or two tricks of his own to capture them, and even if they couldn't be kept for long, at least some information could be squeezed out of them before they escaped.

"It doesn't work like that, Yuffie."

"I don't wanna hear it, Shake!" She was furious. She huffedly turned away from him and stomped toward her wardobe. He never had good news. Pulling out a drawer Yuffie began throwing her clothes mercilessly around the living area, intent on finding something that was comfortable yet worthy of Her Future Lordness. "There's always a few that must be sacrificed so that the objective of a desparate situation can be accomplished!"

"It seems to me that the only person desperate here is yourself."

That was IT. Yuffie came to terms accepting that scowling at Shake did nothing more than fuel his idiocy. He was nothing but trouble. She stomped back over to where he stood, completely putting aside the wardrobe issue for now, and bent down to meet him at eye level. Grabbing his vest with a clenched fist, she mustered every ounce of hate in she could into her voice and hissed in his face. "When my father releases the gods of Da-Chao from that mountain I'll make sure that *you* are so far under their feet people in Rocket Town will be able to see your eyeballs pop out of the ground they walk on!"

Shake was silent for a long moment. With Yuffie's pampered mug an inch away from his face, he shocked her when he couldn't contain his bellylaugh that was itching to get out of his system since the teenaged shrew first opened the door.

"Ha ha hahahahahaha!"

Yuffie was completely puzzled.

"Miss Yuffie," Shake managed to speak inbetween catching his breath, "Mud mask brown does nothing for your complexion! Hahahahaha!..."

Yuffie released her grip on Shake's vest. Over his unstifled laughter the sound of two men arguing outside was barely audible.

"Pardon me, Miss Yuffie...heheheh..." Shake managed to regain control of himself after becoming aware of the arguing himself. "That is my news flash. I must go out and resume my babysitting of Gorky and Chekhov before your *trusted sdvisors* tear each other apart! If you'll excuse me."

Shake backed away from the mud mask covered Yuffie, clearly seeing her face flush bright red under the brown mask. He opened the door and gracefully stepped out into the sun where his fellow advisors, such as they were, were still poring over a small book Gorky held in his hands. Shake heavily walked over to them, stopped himself in front of the two much taller men and silently stood there until his presence was felt.

Chekhov was pointing to some strange looking, old text in a decorative font in the little book Gorky held. "No, the proper incantation is supposed to say, 'Na ch'annamaso dai!', as in, 'We worship at your feet!', because if you say this the way YOU think it to be said, Da-Chao will come after *us* for insulting their feet!"

"Nonsense!" argued Gorky. "The phrase should be just like I said, "Na ch'annakmaso dai!' The context you're using isn't right!"

"Must you be so rock headed! In this sentence the 'k' is silent so the word would be 'worship.' If you say the 'k' then the sentence would read, 'We smell your feet!"

Gorky let his hand with the book fall down at his side and pointed to himself with the other hand as he fumed. He looked like a five year old arguing with his kid brother. "Well, when Miss Yuffie appoints *me* second in command it'll prove that I can read ancient Shinobi text better than you!"

Chekov begged to differ. He put his hands on his hips and defiantly eyed Gorky. "As a matter of fact, Miss Yuffie has already been talking to Godo about appointing *ME* second in command because I actually payed attention to the lessons given to us in wizard school!"

"You're lying! All you did was sleep through classes! There are pictures in our yearbooks from wizard school with Godo trying to wake you up!"

Shake was ready to discipline these two but knew his hands were tied. Godo would never want the two of them punished. They were his favorite two students in wizard school, not for what they learned, but for all the trouble they managed to cause together. They always kept Godo busy, letting himself feeling like he was the one in charge and giving the rest of the school the illusion that he was in control of everything. Shake was the most wise student and his constant correction was the only reason he was kept around. In short, none of these people could think for themselves. Shake sighed in towards himelf. He was tired of constantly doing their thinking for them. No wonder Wutai was going to be the pits to live in again. At least when Meteor threatened the planet everyone worked together sensibly well, all hoping and praying Yuffie would bring home a treasure chest full of mastered materia. Shake, however, wanted her to bring it back honestly, something the rest of Godo's student advisors ddn't want to understand.

Gorky and Chekhov fell to silence with their discovery of Shake watching their discussion. They waited to hear what he might say, half embarrassed, but also half annoyed at being interrupted.

"Let's go, *boys*."

They walked about two steps toward Godo's house before both simultaneously resumed their arguement.

"You never did your homework and you're complaining about *me* sleeping in class!" began Chekhov.

"At least I *remembered* what went on in class, dimwit!"

Shake sighed. The remaining distance to Godo's place was a long way to walk with these two.

"But WHY?"

"Marlene, please hand me that towel over there."

"Tifa." Marlene's persistent inquiries to Cloud's short-temperedness recently were starting to disconcert Tifa. Tifa laughed to herself as she thought that only two people were able to do that to her-Jenova and Marlene. And how different they are!

"Yes, Marlene."

Marlene WOULD get an answer no matter what, as she handed Tifa the yellow striped white towel. "WHYYYYYYYYYYYY?"

"I don't know, Marlene."

"Yes you do. What is wrong with Cloud?" Could never pull one past Marlene, even at her young age. Her most well-learned lesson from her dad, Barett, would have to be her street smarts.

"He's under a lot pressure, dear! Wutai is giving him a real big headache. He's not quite used to being in control of so many people at once."

Marlene had it with Tifa. She went over to where Tifa stood and hopped up onto the table, right in the way where Tifa's next wipe would be with the towel given to her.

"Marlene! This table is dirty! And your clean jeans...!"

Marlene took hold of Tifa's jaw gently with on either side with her tiny hands. Tifa's eyes were wide with shock as to the actions of her little friend. Marlene put her nose right up to Tifa's and frowned as she growled and shook her head, "Nuh-UH."

Tifa sighed while looking into the little girl's deep dark black eyes. Her eyes had to drop down to the table again, embarassed at the little girl's intuition.

_Grooooaaaaan. How do I explain this?_ Tifa thought as she contorted her mind, looking for a way to calm Marlene's boundless curiosity.


	11. Chapter 11

Chapter 11.

_Oh, GAWD, Where am I...urk...ugh...OW!_ Cloud...awoke...so he thought. He wasn't sure. His head hurt like hell. And strangely, so did his left jaw. Ow. Felt like he was...run over by a truck. Maybe he lost control of a chocobo and it kicked him...right in the face. Or wait...

He let out an audible, painful gasp..._Ruby Weapon!_

...ow...no, that's not it...that was a long while ago...

_The party...yeah..._ His face froze in shock, humiliation, and terror. _Oh, God! The party! What happened?_

After piecing together his mental bearings through a sea of pain, it was time to get the physical bearings straightened out. Where was he? He looked up. A blur...no, a gold ceiling fan with wood and burgundy stripes. The _Cloud Nine_. Yeah, that's where he was. He was somehow on his back, on a bench, in a booth in the _Cloud Nine.__Ow._

He must have made it home somehow...well, he was sure he'd hear about it sometime. He laboredly picked himself up and heavily walked toward the door leading into the living room of his and Tifa's place. He had some things to straighten out paperworkwise...so maybe that'll clear his head...and help him remember what happened.

He made it up the steps, pitifully holding his head the whole time. His jaw REALLY felt swollen. _Maybe Tifa has some ice in the kitchen upstairs._ She was really picky about using things for the bar for personal use. "Helps separate business from pleasure expenses!" she always says.

He opened the door to the living room, and looked at his pile of papers on the low coffee table in the middle of the furniture. They were shuffled through, he just knew it. He tried to keep them relatively presentable at Tifa's request. But he definitely didn't fiddle through them and leave them all scattered on the table like this. Boy, his head hurt.

"Oh, hi...Cid."

...

_CID!_

Cloud looked up, trying desperately not to turn his head too quickly. Yup, there was the crusty old pilot, riffling through some papers in his hand, as if inspecting it so it would be acceptable to his standards. But his eyes said he wasn't thinking about what was on the papers.

Cloud sat himself down opposite the pilot and supported his elbows on his knees, pathetically holding his head again to keep it from exploding.

The two men sat in a stiff silence for a few seconds. Cid Highwind, surprisingly, was the first to speak.

"Remind me and the rest of the boys to NEVER let you get that drunk again. 'Kay kiddo?"

Cloud grooooooooaned. He managed to poke his eyes up and try to look at Cid through the spiky blonde hair on his head. _Ow. Better not do that,_ he thought to himself when he felt his head swimming, and immediately lowered his eyes back to looking ashamedly at the floor through his fingers.

Cid plopped the papers down on the table and stood up, going to the window. When he got there, he opened up the blinds so the both of them could see the bright afternoon sunlight. Cloud cringed with head pain.

"I thought it was be a pretty amusing sight to see, since you could be a little square more than one in a while, kiddo."

Cloud silently closed his eyes and felt himself falling. _Whoa, better not do that either_, he internally repremanded himself.

"Wanna know...um...everything?"

"MmmmmmHm," Cloud managed to answer, fighting the light from the window.

"Sure?"

Cloud managed to worriedly look up at the older man. For Cid Highwind to ask whether someone was "sure", it would have to be a pretty definite "sure". This made Cloud pretty sure he didn't want to hear it. But it...it had to be done.

The look in Cloud's eyes said he wanted to know what happened. They, of course, lied. But, even if Cloud wasn't interested in hearing the details of what happened between entering the door to the building with Vincent and just waking up a few minutes ago, Cid thought he'd have to know anyway. Too bad!

Cid took a deep breath. "Ahright. Here goes."

"Cid...hold a sec." Cloud raised a hand. Cid thought he had second thought about hearing the action and adventure that transpired afterall.

"Y...yeah?"

"Could you...close that blind?" Cloud waved a hand in front, gesturing toward the window, while fruitlessly trying to shield his face with the other.

"Blind? Oh...okay." Cid took another deep breath and regarded his comrade and friend, who managed to pick his face up out of his hands in the muted light. "Well...ah...first of all, you had quite a time with Bunny."

"Bunny?"

"You know, Bunny? The dancer?"

"Uuuuuugh..."

"Well, you were doin' really good holdin' your own, even with that drinkin' contest you had with Vincent! But uh, the more you had, the more Bunny looked interestin' to ya...at least, that's what me and Barett noticed...I was sorta...outa whack myself, but you see, Barett was the designated levelhead for the night and..."

"AND?" _Ow._

"Well...we found ya in the kitchen makin' out with Bunny, and when we confonted ya about it, ya relly lost it. And when we reminded ya of Tifa and the fact you're gonna get hitched soon after all this is over, you sorta...spilled the beans about what's been botherin' your noggin recently."

Cloud's eyes opened wide as he realized his "big secret" was out. "I...let everyone know about...?"

"Well, yeah. THEN we had to control ya becuase you were sorta standin' in the way of Bunny gettin' out of the room, and you started ta pick another fight with Barett, y'know, turning tables over and stuff..."

_Oh, GAWD!_ Cloud listened, desperately wanting to crawl under a rock.

"So he kinda had ta...knock ya out."

"Ugggghhh. knock me out." Cloud repeated deliberately, trying to wish it all wasn't true.

"Yeah, kiddo. Then we sort of dragged you home, and I said I'd stay, and see when ya woke up, and I told Tifa what happened, so she's out now tryin' to put the place back together with Barett...and..."

"AND?"

"Well...that's the story."

As if to add insult to injury, he had let loose his most vulnerable secret, mostly at the fault of his friends. He felt bad about rashing the place. He felt REALLY awful about hitting on the girl when he's engaged to...

Tifa. That's what he felt the worst about. he let his personal problems out, and embarrassed Tifa at the same time.

"Hey. if you need anything...we're all here. maybe we can research or something for ya." Cid was spurred into an unusual display of consolation by letting Cloud know what happened. Suddenly, though, he brightened. "But, HEY! Look at the bright side. Barett would be the first ta get over the whole thing!"


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter 12.

Tifa slammed down her pencil on the desk, ending a failed attempt to distract herself by figuring out some new additions to the bar when she and Cloud were wed. It had been a couple days of her and Cloud's hiding out in a hotel in the still-war torn and unrepaired sector 3 of Midgar. She desperately wanted to get back to the abandoned _Cloud Nine_; which now was completely on the opposite side of the city. In her absence her employees were taking care of it, but the _Cloud Nine_ had been her creation. She felt as if she had abandoned her child.

"Cloud, we shouldn't be hiding from someone like HER! We need to go to Wutai and give her a piece of our mind!"

"Tifa, I think this is the best way, for now. I still feel I must stay here until we have some sort of idea what they want, and how strong they are."

"Cloud, I want to get back to the bar."

"We WILL, Tifa...wait until this resolves...they know where the Cloud Nine is and if they find you there.."

So it went back and forth between Cloud and Tifa almost constantly now. Cloud had received a letter by way of shuriken that both he and Tifa were in danger of Wutai's ninja spies placed around the city. There have been more than enough attacks on the city by fire, and their seriousness had escalated so that now casualties were a major concern. Cloud agreed there have been too many already. Yuffie sent a letter saying that they were aware of the bar's position, and would set it on fire in the midst of the night if Cloud didn't present himself in Wutai immediately.

"Cloud, we just can't run like this..."

"If any of us goes to Wutai, I think there's a pretty good chance they'll become prisoners of war pretty quickly. I'm not sacrificing any of my friends for Wutai. Especially not YOU."

Tifa huffed. Cloud had a point. They had no powerful magic since the materia was destroyed by Aeris, and Wutai definitely had wizards, magical beings and entities guarding the city, anyone who went there would be seriously at a disadvantage. Even Cloud, with the mighty Ultima weapon, would be easily outnumbered by the forces of soldiers reportedly being trained by Yuffie. As long as they were "missing" for awhile, Cloud could continue his duties in some sort of peace while the rest of his friends repaired damage and brought city morale back up from scraping the bottom, as it had when ShinRa was in power.

Cloud sat in front of the T.V., watching the news. Tifa liked to work at night; Cloud during the day. He never thought about how opposite some things they did were, and although the recent past has been a particularily hard trial on their relationship, he knew it would end soon, and they'd be wed.

But he couldn't deny it...every time he DID think about the future, he thought about the effect of being repeatedly exposed to Mako had dme to him. That is, made him sterile and unable to have natural children. And, of course, this is the one thing Tifa was so repeatedly adamant about early in their relationship after defeating Sephiroth. Verbally she'd been pretty quiet lately, especially since she knew his "secret" was out, but he knew she was thinking about it all the time. He didn't know what he would do the next time she mentioned anything about kids. It drove him crazy.

Cloud heard Tifa push the chair back wih a squeak on the uncarpeted, hardwood floor. She brought herself around the couch and curled up aside of Cloud. She wrapped her feminine, but muscled arms around Cloud and leaned her head on his shoulder. She just loved playing with that stud in his ear.

"Cloud."

"Yeah?"

"Y'know, we can always adopt."

Not good timing on Tifa's part. Cloud excused imself from Tifa's embrace, and the chair, and made his way to the bedroom.

"What? Did I do something-"

"Tifa, can't you just drop it for now? We talk about that almost every time we're alone."

"But Cloud, why can't we talk about it now? The best time to talk is NOW when we're alone! What if we get separated or-"

"Tifa, no. I know what you want. I want that too. That solution wouldn't be good in the long run."

"Cloud, I can't belive you would say that. Look at Aeris! She was perfectly happy and SHE wasn't Elmyra's child!"

"This isn't about Aeris. Look, just...not now."

"You're running away again."

"Running away?"

Tifa's impatience was mounting. "YES! Everytime someting comes up that needs to be hit on the nose to be dealt with, you run away! You did it when you were 16, you did it with Wutai, and NOW..you're doing it with me."

At this point Cloud was noticeably irritated. "There is a BIG difference between running away and taking things one step at a time! That's what I want to do!" It was happening all over again for him and Tifa.

"And you'll be nintey by the time you get around to that ONE issue that should have been dealt with when you were 25!"

Cloud let out a huge sigh. "I just can't see-"

"WHAT?" Tifa shot back. "You can't see us getting married becuase of what happened to you? Cloud! There are ways of getting around that! There are more tests, more procedures, more things to try!"

Cloud suddenly remembered Cid saying something about investigating the casualties caused by Wutai. They ahd been trying to pinpoint exactly how many ninjas Wutai had sent over, and Vincent was very close to calculating that. Cloud had intended to stay home and relax, but duty, as usual, called him to action.

"I have to go." He grabbed some papers from the desk where Tifa previously sat and headed for the door.

"WHERE?"

"I have to meet Cid and Vincent. They're attempting to estimate the number Wutai's ninja force."

She crossed her arms in fury. Her eyes were flaming a darker shade now. She silently paused a moment, then cutting asked, "Are they EXPECTING you?"

"No, but I need to know that information as soon as possible."

She turned away. She unfloded her arms, and Cloud saw she was doing something with her left hand fingers. As she turned back around, she had the meteorite engagement ring between her fingers in her right hand. "Cloud, if you keep running away from these important things, I really don't know if I should be wearing this."

Cloud stood there, gaping at Tifa and puzzled at what she just did. Tifa glared at him, and for emphasis threw the diamond-like meteorite ring on the table inbetween the TV and the sofa where they had embraced only just moments ago. It bounced off and landed somewhere on the floor with a TINK, TINK, tink, until it rested somewhere where neither of them could see.

Cloud continued out the door without a word.

Tifa kept her furious glare at the place where Cloud stood. "You ass," she whispered. Fighting Sephiroth was much easier than fighting the tears forming in her eyes.

Cloud exited the cheap hotel and turned toward the gold chocobo hitched up in between the hotel and the next building. Cloud hoped this was a decently inconspicuous place to hide his magical steed. The covering made the walkway between the buildings relatively dark enough by night so noone would notice the animal there. It was also far enough away from the streetlights so ther'd be no chance of the feathers catching any attention by shimmering when the light hit them. Cloud noticed the chocobo wasn't exactly happy with this new setup, but for now, like the cheap hotel, it was necessary.

As soon as he was finished greeting the bird and stroking it's beautiful feathers lovingly, the PHS rang in his pocket. _That must be Barett, gonna ask me to show up. Well, at least I can tell her they were hoping I'd show up anyway..._

He flicked it open and put it to his ear.

"Hel-"

"-GET YOUR BLONDE BUTT TO WUTAI PRONTO OR SHE'S DEAD!"

"Yuffie? Wha-"

"YOU heard what I said! GET on that bird, GET that professional butter knife of yours and GET over to Wutai!"

Just then something flew behind his head and THOCKED! itself into wall. Cloud ducked, but it would have been way too late. An inch over to the left and it would have hit him. He realized what had happened and turned around to look at what just whizzed by. It was a shuriken stuck into the wall, blatantly bearing the emblem of Wutai.

Cloud turned to his PHS again. "Your boys have lousy aim, Yuffie." He could just see Yuffie furiously waving her arms in the air. He succeeded in made her bad temper worse. "THAT WAS A WARNING SHOT, LOSER! Our ninjas are more than capable of hacking your skull in two whenever we wish! We STILL know where you are! Produce yourself in Wutai by sundown tomorrow or your bimbo dies!"

*Click* went the PHS as Cloud shut it. He knew he should have destroyed Yuffie's PHS when everything was over.

Cloud turned and sadly spoke out loud to the hotel. "Sorry, Tifa...Don't expect me back anytime soon. Please understand."


	13. Chapter 13

Chapter 13.

There it was. Yuffie's father's pagoda. It seemed like no one was around. Cloud thought otherwise. He halted his gold chocobo, Sunrise, and assuredly patted the gold bird's beak after dismounting him. Sunrise warbled and cooed softly. The chocobo made the long trip in almost a third of the time. This was a long trip for the bird and he was ready for a rest. The only reasons the chocobo wasn't used every trip was that it was dangerous for the bird, and tiring. This was a steed that was designed for the fastest speed over a short distance, not a cross country trip from morning until night, even though it could cross mountains, run over fire, and even walk on water.

Cloud walked the beast a short way, using the bird's harness to guide him, looking for an opportunity to put him in some hidden corner of town where it could graze. He did so, and the bird was more than happy to take a break. Cloud gave the bird one last pat on the beak. Sunrise seemed like he might even take a nap in the shade.

Cloud didn't even have to turn around.

He knew, somehow without looking, that a shiny, sharp katana was pointed at the back of his head, waiting to sever his head off with any unpredicted move. _Must be another effect of that stupid Mako, this sensing things..._ Cloud thought.

"Are you my accompaniment to Godo's place?"

He felt a slight prod on a shoulder, and the ninja bahind him muttered something that was only one syllable, but was obviously meant to say _Get moving with us or else, prisoner._ Cloud slowly raised his hands above his head and turned around to meet his greeting party. Hmmmm. Three ninjas. Yuffie must have thought Cloud would scare a lone aggressor with his Ultima weapon, shining a blazing white on the outside with a small center of deep cobalt. The party of four began their way to the pagoda.

Inside the pagoda, the richly decorated walls were a contrast to the bare, dark mahogany wood floor. The floor had been unfortunately permanently nicked here and there from when Godo and his daughter fought each other for their honor a while back. That was a long time ago, thought Cloud, and the staff at the pagoda tried to do a good job in covering the imperfections in the hardwood, but they were too deep for just some wax and polishing to cover.

Cloud's train of thought was brought to an abrupt halt by a ninja's sword suddenly brought across his chest. They were giving Cloud a not-so-obvious hint to stop walking. Yuffie and her father glared at Cloud. Or rather, Cloud's sword on his back, so Cloud noticed. And the materia still in one of the slots.

Godo took a step forward and began to speak. "Mr. Strife. We bring you here with the underst-"

"Let me do the talkin', old man!" in a witchly, shrieky voice suddenly was heard from behind Godo. Yuffie seemed furious as she stomped toward Cloud. She pushed aside her father and brandished her huge shuriken at Cloud. A short man, no more than three feet tall, whom Cloud recognized as Shake, rolled his eyes at the girl's obnoxious behavior. Two other taller men snorted and tried to hold in a chuckle, obviously supporting Yuffie's direct way of dealing with things. He thought he remembered them as...Gorky and Chekov? Godo took the initiative to wave a finger at the ninjas and dismiss them from the room. _Well, someone actually DOES listen to him_, Cloud thought.

"Gimme your PHS now!" Yuffie ordered Cloud.

Cloud reached into his shirt pocket, under extreme scrutiny of Godo's attendants. When he handed the small device to Yuffie, she immediately threw it high up in the air. She almost casually tossed her shuriken at it, and it was a direct hit. The PHS exploded in a display of electric sparks and fell to the ground in a million broken pieces of wire, metal and plastic.

Not skipping a beat after her remarkable display of accuracy, she caught her shiruken as it returned to her, and brought her attention immediately back to Cloud. "You know what I want, blondie!"

"Maybe I do."

Yuffie's eyes were on fire. "Hand it over NOW, smartass!"

"Well, there are a couple things you don't understan-"

"YOU have a materia in that weapon of yours! That's all I NEED to understand! Take it out NOW or I'll take it out myself!"

"I've tried to remove it! You've seen yourself how it jumped in the materia slot! After it landed in there, I tried for days to pry it out and it seems like it's permanently imbedded in there!"

Yuffie was struck into thoughtful silence, still glaring.

"And you also know you won't be able to take it out yourself. No one but myself and Tifa can touch this weapon without getting a good zap."

Yuffie stomped over to where Cloud stood and got within an inch of his face. "You are a LIAR," she hissed.

"Nope. Seems like you are just not meant to have this weapon or the materia in it, Yuffie."

Cloud's coolness was driving Yuffie insane. She knew he was right. She turned away, desperately trying not to slap him across the face for his arrogance.

After she got far enough away, she turned to face him again. Plan B. "Then activate it! Let's see what it does! Activate it NOW, blonde bomb!"

"I can't do that either," said Cloud.

Yuffie had had it. She raised her shuriken, about to give him a terribl blow to the head. A hand caught her arm and stopped her from hitting Cloud with it.

"Yuffie, dear..." whispered Godo into Yuffie's ear.

The only word those in the room heard was an exasperated "WHAT!" from Yuffie as she realized that someone was stopping her from venting her anger.

Godo continued to keep his voice low. "Believe what he says...this is, in fact, a really good thing. Allow me to explain. What that is, is a self-sctivated materia. You don't have to 'invoke' it, it just works on it's own when it's worn. Remember, you had some of those? Like 'Counter', that helped the wearer use a counterattack when harmed in battle? And 'Encounter Half', that helped the whole party conserve energy by scaring away weaker enemies so battle wouldn't be necessary?"

Yuffie slowly nodded as she comprehended what her father was saying.

"Well, dear, this is the same thing! All we must know is which type of materia it is and use it to our advantage!"

"Hmmmmm," hmmmmmed Yuffie.

Godo stepped away from his daughter and approached Cloud. He circled around to Cloud's back where the Ultima weapon rested, strapped there in it's holster.

"_The hell is he gonna do?_" thought Yuffie.

"Hmmmm. White materia. Never seen one before." Godo held out a hand over the strange white orb in one of the Ulima weapon's materia slots. Both his hand and the materia glowed white for a second as Godo closed his eyes in concentration. At this point of knowing Cloud and his weapon for so long, Godo was cautious enough not to touch the weapon directly.

Yuffie thought that she was pretty darn lucky to have a father with natural magical talent. _Makes up for his stupid behavior_, she thought to herself, trying to keep a chuckle inside.

Godo's hand stopped glowing. He opened his eyes, and thought for another moment. With childish glee, he SLAPPED his hands together and rubbed them like he had found something extremely useful for Wutai's purposes.

"This...this is...wonderful!" he exclaimed.

The rest of the Wutai party stood there, silent and confused.

He excitedly turned toward his daugher. "Yuffie, dear! You were right all along! This is...this might just be all we need!"

"What are you talking about?" Chekov asked the question that was on everyone's inquiring mind at that moment.

Godo literally ran from behind Cloud to face his daughter and attendants. "This," and he gestured toward the weapon, "is a self activated SUMMON materia!"

Chekov and Gorky looked at each other with an "oooooooh!". Even Shake raised his eyebrows. However, Yuffie didn't want to act TOO impressed until she knew what the old magician was talking about.

"AND?" she cut in impatiently, tapping her foot with her arms crossed.

"AND," Godo continued, "it must be one powerful summon indeed. To have the planet control it's activation! This must be bigger than Knights of the Round!"

"Can you tell whose summon it is?" asked Shake, now very curious.

"No, it's energy is blocking me from knowing that. All I know is it's an extremely powerful summon. I...I dare say it may be more powerful than...than Da-chao itself." Godo started stroking his chin, in obviously deep thought.

The three attendants gasped. And surprisingly, so did Yuffie!

"And...I think I can come up with a theory of how it is activated."

The attendants glowed a shade brighter at their leader's sudden brilliance. Yuffie leaned forward, anxious to hear more. Godo began to pace the room, stroking his chin. _*Now* he pretends to be a scholar,_ Yuffie commented to herself.

"I believe the chances are great to perfect that this is an offensive summon. All summons I know about are offensive tools."

"But, Godo...what about Hades?" asked Gorky.

"Hades is an indirect attack. He changed statuses of the summoner's enemies, but his summon was still used offensively. There's a difference between an indirect attack and a defensive action." Godo perked up and looked up at his troupe in the pagoda. He was so proud of his inerrable logic his eyes lit up the room. "Therefore, I think this materia can only be activated in battle, since we have seen that all summon materia is used offensively."

"So?" Yuffie pried, a little more curious now than confrontational. Seems that her father's logic made sense even to her.

Godo walked away from Cloud and then gestured for his attendants to gather round. "Here's what we'll do." They huddled together and chatted for a minute or two. Cloud was puzzled. He never thought that the leaders of Wutai could act so organized, like a football team.

The huddle broke and they all seemed to be sneering evilly at an otherwise clueless Cloud Strife. Yuffie put a hand on her hip and strolled toward Cloud once again. She had a terribly wicked grin on her face for such a young girl.

"We think a little competition is on order here. *And* we have the perfect playmate for you," Yuffie hissed.


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter 14.

Cloud was lead back out of the pagoda by Yuffie, her father, and their attendants. They took him out to the main part of the town, and took a left into the mountainous area behind Wutai. There they stopped, at the foot of the imposing mountain of Da-Chao.

"You're going to have me fight Da-Chao!" Cloud asked, at the same time puzzled and shocked. He wondered what kind of magic they had to bring the stone to life, gazing at the mile-high figure before him.

"Yup!" Yuffie answered. "If Da-Chao wins, we'll prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Wutai IS, in fact, the most powerful place on the planet! If you win, both you AND your guardian summon will serve us, and we'll still be the most powerful place on the planet! HA! You see Cloud? This is a win-win situation!"

Yuffe obviously was blind to the fact that a guardian like Aeris could never be controlled. They'll just have to find out for themselves.

Strangely, he wasn't afraid of what Da-Chao could do to him. He knew the moment a mortal blow was about to be dealt to him, the materia would be activated. It was just keeping himself in one piece long enough for his friends to find out something was wrong. However, he couldn't afford to lose this battle either, and allow more fuel to the blazing fire of Yuffie's overwhelming arrogance.

He wondered, above all, if Tifa could forgive him for making so abrupt a disappearance. But...on the other hand, her last few words to him angered him so that if he did see her again he had no idea how he'd handle it. He was really counting on _not_ seeing her. After all, what if they just got together becuase they were going through the same circumstances and struggles, and not for love? Did they just mistake commiseration for love? Probably so, in Cloud's opinion. Now that Sephiroth ws destroyed, they pretty much proved to be two totally opposite personalities. There was nothing to be unified for anymore. Aeris could fix his body anytime, but his mind would permanently be in turmoil from the effects the materia exposure dealt him over the years.

The attendants, Gorky and Chekov, walked out in front of Godo, followed by Cloud, and lastly, the ever-vigilant Yuffie was last in line, shuriken at the ready, watchful that Cloud didn't pull anything funny while they were on the way to summon Da-Chao.

The group stopped at the base of the Da-Chao mountains. When they had all settled thmselves, both Gorky and Chekov turned to Godo, hands clasped with excitement. Gorky pushed aside Chekov rudely and went up to his boss's face. "Now, sir, allow me to invoke the holiness...of Da-Chao!" he said with a sickeningly obseqious bow.

Chekov then pushed aside Gorky with a hard shove, knocking him off balance for a moment. Godo was silent so far watching the odd pair. "No, Gorky, you are SERIOUSLY mistaken. Godo and Miss Yuffie want ME to do the honor!"

Gorky retaliated with an equally strong shove, so now both men decided to glare at each other. "YOU are an irritating man, Chekov!" Gorky shot back. He continued, "I happen to have a superbly resonant voice to summon Da-Chao!" as he puffed his chest.

"Resonant voice! I happened to have been the Wutai Forensic Team champion in wizard school! Or do you make up your own achievements to cover the fact that YOU have none!"

At this point the two men started rolling up their sleeves! They intended to have a magic match to see who the REAL summoner of Da-Chao should be!

Godo stepped inbetween, just as he had done over and over for years. "Gentlemen. Please. I intended from the beginning to have Gorky summon the Holiness of Da-Chao this time."

The two men straightened. Gorky's smirk was countered by Chekov's sad glare.

With utter calmness, Godo further separated the two men. He held up a finger. "However, the next time Wutai has a devious plan to overtake the planet you, Chekov, may summon Da-Chao."

If Chekov was a puppy dog, his tail would be wagging.

After the brief logistics issue, Gory had the small book that Shake had seen him carry before. Gorky walked further towards the huge figure of Da-Chao, separating himelf from the rest of the onlookers. He flipped to a page. He rested his hand on the open page of the little book, and, unseen to those behind him, closed is eyes. Cloud heard him mumble something in some God-forsaken language he's never heard. Maybe the spell was a ritual for Wutai. Or maybe it had something to do with the culture of the Ancients. Cloud thought he heard "channamakso"? That was the only sound he could pick out amidst the babble.

Gorky continued reciting the spell to free Da-Chao. Suddenly a terrible wind blew, and Gorky was having a tough time speaking above it. The wind strengthened until Cloud was sure the only that kepr him on the ground was the weight of the Ultima weapon.

"I'M STILL WATCHIN' YOU, NITWIT!" Cloud heard Yuffie shriek behind him. It was pretty pointless now to make such a statement as both himself and Yuffie were desperately fighting to stay on the ground from the gale-force wind.

Suddenly, as Gorky continued to chant, a huge sheet of ice formed from nowhere around the statue of Da-Chao, covering it in a thick blue layer of sheer cold. The layer of ice broke with an explosive blast and then, seemingly behind it, was a complete wall of fire. The fire then seemed to be extinguished by the earth crumbling around the figure of Da-Chao itself. Four major basic elements were obviously at work in this summoning, and probably more that were unseen.

The fierce wind died down and the earth shook from the falling boulders around Da-Chao. A huge hand moved. A foot shifted. An eye opened! The huge Wutai god stood stright and tall, so high in the air people could not even see his head. Yuffie, Godo and the others had to make a run for it not to get crushed in the process. The mighty god lifted his arms as the stone contuniued to crumble away. Huge boulders were like dust to the sleeping guardian, now awakened. Da-Chao lived and breathed again.

As he lowered his right hand, he clenched it, and something was brought down from the very air. it was a huge sword. The sword must have been ten feet wide and half a mile long, with seemingly out-of-place delicate emblems and symbols on the blade, shimmering a hot red. The designs were obviously glowing coals of fire. A fitting weapon for a god.

The giant suddent squatted, Sumo-style, and planted his blade straight down. The tip of the blade itself must have created a seemingly bottomless pit in the earth. With a thunderous voice, Da-Chao questioned his onlookers, "WHY DO YOU SUMMON ME?"

"Your Holiness!" Godo yelled, wondering whether the huge god could hear such a small creature as himself. "We as-"

"SCUSE me, Pops!" Yuffie pushed in front of her father. _Ah,_ Godo thought, _she has a voice that will...eh...carry better than my own_ he thought to himself, and let her take the spotlight in supplicating Da-Chao.

Yuffie was expecting Da-Chao to acknowledge her, but since he did not, she was taken aback for a moment. Obviously nothing was sacred to her, not even her town's legendary god. "Well," she continued after recovering, "obviously you can HEAR ME!" she yelled. She pointed furiously with a finger behind her at Cloud. "THIS man is a danger to our beautiful town! He has single-handedly destroyed every bit of materia that Wutai has earned during the days of Meteor and is now building a military force in Midgar! he has defeated numerous powerful enemies before, single-handedly, and his destruction is now directed at US!"

_Single-handedly?_ Yuffie's lie resonated loudly in Cloud's mind.

Da-Chao didn't utter a sound. Instead, he arose to his full intimidating height again. He brought up his sword. And placed the tip inbetween Cloud's eyebrows.

_Holy hell, this is bad!_ Cloud sweated as the tip of the humongous sword rested right inbetween his eyebrows. It felt like the sword would scald the hair right off his face.

With an unseen force, Cloud was BLOWN away not without a scream, hitting back first into a rock wall behind where he was standing. The ultima sword took most of the impact for him...this time. However, it looked a light shade of powder blue. Da-Chao hardly had to move to intitiate an attack.

When Cloud cleared the cobwebs out of his head, he looked up, WAY up. And noticed Da-Chao ready to thrust his sword into the ground. Cloud knew this was also going to be a very bad thing for him.

Da-Chao brought the mighty weapon up just a bit (in Da-Chao relative terms) and slammed it into the ground. Yuffie thought she herself was going to be sacrificed also as the earth shook and boulders fell from the sky with the impact.

Yuffie could barely outrun the falling boulders. "HEY! WATCH IT!" she shrieked as she dashed side to side.

A chasm appeared at the impact point of the sword in the ground. It grew longer and wider, snaking its way in the ground. And it headed straight for Cloud.

Cloud tried in vain to hoof it away from the crack in the ground. The cleft caught up to him as he ran, and opened up right underneath him. He managed to catch the side of the fast-opening chasm and hang on for dear life. He hung there for a second, trying to get hs bearings and slowly pulled himself up. he was in fact more terrified than he thought he'd be. The Ultima weapon flashed a dark powder blue.

As soon as he crawled out, gasping from horror rather than lack of breath, he stood face-to point at the fire sword again. Another blast of force sent him right across the chasm, into a boulder Da-Chao dropped when he was released from the mountain. The Ultima weapon CRACKED with a metallic ring against the stone, and turned yet another shade darker.


	15. Chapter 15

Chapter 15.

Cloud Strife was starting to get pretty ticked.

He shook off the cobwebs again...those cobwebs were hard to shake off this time. He somehow had the presence of mind to draw the powder-blue Ultima weapon from its sheath on his back and finally try to make some use out of it.

The huge Wutai god had another attack planned. This time Cloud would be ready...he thought. He got into his defensive position, the Ultima weapon's point aimed straight for the huge god's midsection...as his head was a bit out of reach.

Da-Chao pointed his weapon again at Cloud. Surprisingly, without word or motion, the point glowed a brilliant, hot white. It grew in size until it was twice Cloud's height, and then something from it was coming straight for him. It was glowing hot coal-red, and turned like a tornado.

The mighty god let loose the strongest fire attack Cloud had ever seen.

He instinctively flattened the blade in front of him, crouched down and waited for the spell to reach him. He was sure the Ultima weapon could withstand any magical attack, and would be able to protect him until the spell wore off. And...when it did, Da-Chao would get hit with a powerful attack of his own.

The heat could be felt from yards away as the beam of pure fire headed toward Cloud. The roar and crackling of the magic fire reached him in a moment, and practically exploded with a mighty energy as it hit the broad blade of the weapon, supported on one side by Cloud's hand on the hilt and by the other with a hand on the other side of the flattened blade, both hands straining to push against the force of the spell. Soon it would be over, and Cloud would use the Omnislash to pull off a devastating, embarrasing loss for Wutai and the power-hungry Yuffie Kisaragi. Hopefully that would make the young girl learn what true power is, as obviously Sephiroth's defeat hadn't sunk in to her mind yet.

Cloud had to dig the heels of his boots into the ground. The spell kept firing away, pushing Cloud back inch by inch, distancing Cloud from the spell's caster and causing him to lose precious ground as he waited for the spell to abate. The sheer heat of the spell surrounding him was making sweat pour out of his skin; he was sure he'd be soaking wet by the time it was over.

After a full minute of pushing against the fire spell's force, his left hand was starting to get warm. Hot. Even burn. He knew if he didn't get himself out of this somehow he'd have a sizzling hand in a few moments, a serious handicap in countering the monster's fierce attacks.

Cloud gritted his teeth, hoping it would help him summon some super-human strength to keep his defense from the blaze effective. He looked down and noticed deep gouges in the dirt below him from being pushed back by Da-Chao's magic spell. In fact, he managed to peek behind himself quickly and noticed he was slowly being forced to back up right into a huge boulder. _Uh-oh! This is a bad thing!_ he thought to himself as the flames kept shooting out of the tip of his opponen't weapon.

He had a second thought. _ Or *is* it a bad thing?_

From their view of the battle, Yuffie and the others were almost blinded by a sheer wall of hot, glowing red light. "I'm sure glad we're safe from the heat here," Yuffie said to interrupt interrupted her posse's spectating. "I would completely singe all my gorgeous Shinobi hair off with that powerful attack by the holy Da-Chao!" she snidely said to no one in particular. And after no one in particular acknowledged her statement, her face grew as red as the flames. "ISN'T THAT RIGHT!" She shrieked at them.

"Yes, Yuffie! Yes, Miss Yuffie!" Her underlings and her father quickly derailed their interest in the fight and nodded and bowed to assure their most beloved Materia Hunter. Except Shake, of course.

As Godo, Gorky, and Chekov were nodding and yes-maaming the furious girl, the glow from Da-Chao's Fire attack was suddenly...just not there. They all turned to see why.

Cloud was no where to be found.

Yuffie was overjoyed. "Da-Chao won! The Blonde Bomb is burned to a barbeque crispy!" She proudly turned once again to the cowering supporters behind her. "Shall we have his remains shish-kebabed on his own weapon, or what?"

The other three cackled along with her.

Shake was silent and watchful.

They were stopped in their track by a blaze of white light and a high, shrill sound coming from behind the rocks.

From behind the rock, Cloud had raised his weapon to the sky, and a single point of light glowed at the tip. All was deadly silent as the shrill sound of the Ultima weapon getting ready for it's attack drowned out even the sound of the strong wind blowing at the foot of what was once the Da-Chao memorial. A whitish-blue light bathed Cloud in it's glow. He held the sword by it's blade and then returned it to its ready position.

Cloud flew from behind the rock, to Yuffie's terrified surprise. "He's..._alive_!"

In utter fury, Cloud began striking Da-Chao with heavy blows...one,two,three,four,...ten...eleven...twelve...each one shattering the very air around the Ultima weapon, now glowing a bright sapphire blue.

At least fifteen blows later, all of Cloud's fury had dissipated, and he fell to the ground, and down to one knee, utterly exhausted from the exertion of the Omnislash. He looked up, and slowly the dust cleared.

Cloud was waiting to see Da-Chao reduced to ashes from his ultimate attack.

The smoke was still thick and hung like a veil between the remains of Da-Chao and Cloud.

He could see a large dark shadow coming through the haze.

The shadow to...a huge fist!

Cloud tried to get up to run...but could go no further. He had mustered everything he had and put it into his final attack. It was the same one that put the finishing blow to Sephiroth. He had counted on it being able to level the stone god, also.

He cursed himself for not putting even more into it.

Da-Chao brought his meaty fingers around Cloud and put the squeeze on him. Cloud dropped the Ultima weapon and it landed blade-first into the ground, sparks flying as it bit into the sandy earth. Cloud was brought up to face-level with the giant. He was squeezed even harder.

Cloud let a scream loose as the pressure around his body shot the air out of him.

Da-Chao turned toward yuffie and her troupe. His voice thundered a question. "ARE YOU SURE THIS MAN IS A POWERFUL ENEMY TO WUTAI? HE CANNOT EVEN DEFEND HIMSELF."

Yuffie was put on the spot by her town's own god! "Y...yes! Finish him off! He's a lot more powerful than he's acting! He took all the materia away somehow! He's the only one that could do it!"

The god's stony face looked genuinely doubtful for a second. Thinking he could trust a Wutai leader whose underlings had summoned him, he accepted her lie again. "AS YOU WISH."

Da -Chao squeezed Cloud so hard he felt things popping. Having no more energy or air to scream, it didnt' take him long at all to go limp in the giant's hand. Realizing it was tme to end his victim's suffering, Da-Chao dropped Cloud's body to the ground, and it bounced like a rag doll as it hit the earth, and rested face up. Cloud didn't even look like he was breathing from afar.

The sword was raised, point down, right above Cloud. The Wutai giant would cleave Cloud in half, thereby defeating his enemy. The mile-long sword was thrust downward, intending to sever Cloud's head from the rest of him.

A rainbow light.

The sword came screeching down toward Cloud.

A mist of green, and a figure appeared.

And all that stopped the gigantic sword from cleaving Cloud Strife in two was one young woman's single delicate finger.

The god's eyes widened. Godo, Yuffie, Chekov and Gorky stood shocked. Shake stopped breathing himself for a minute, as the woman drenched in green light stood over Cloud's body. The only thing she used to stop the sword was one finger. She stood with her arm raised, a towering, indomitable entity in front of her and a humongous sword, hundreds of times her size above her, and stopped the blade with a single finger. She wasn't even straining. One finger precisely on the tip of Da-Chao's flame sword and the final move was blocked.

Da-Chao tried to remove the sword from her block as slowly and respectfully as he could. He went down on one knee, shaking the earth when the weight of his huge leg hit the ground. The greenish lady lowered her arm to her side as the God of Wutai gave his apology.

He bowed his head toward Aeris. "I CAN INSULT THE GUARDIAN OR HER KEEPER NO LONGER."

She spoke loud enough so that not only Da-Chao, but also Yuffie's party could hear her. Her voice almost sounded magically amplified.

"I admire your willingness to defend the continent you yourself have created, Da-Chao! However, you have been handed untruths from the moment you reawakened! The leaders of Wutai have insulted your name by calling you forth and attempting to use you as merely a pawn in their game for acquirung power!" She had a strange tone to her voice, not repremanding at all. More like...educating.

Da-Chao's voice boomed across the mountainside and back again. "I HEAR THE GUARDIAN."

"You were correct in questioning the information presented to you! I suggest you sleep for one hundered years! The leaders of Wutai have not learned through the mistakes of Shinra and Sephiroth! Their prayers and pleadings for your help should not be answered for the next century! Not even their children's children will be able to summon your might in repayment for their motives!"

"I WILL OBEY THE GUARDIAN."

Yuffie was shocked. She vaguely recognized the form of the girl in green. It was...yes!...Aeris Gainsborough! The materia summoned the most powerful entity on the planet, and that entity is...Aeris Gainsborough! She stopped Da-Chao's weapon with no effort at all! She must truly be powerful! Yuffie was tickled pink. She personally knew the most powerful entity on the planet! This was a better opportunity than she had thought!

But...why wasn't Da-Chao trying to finish off Cloud anyway? Surely it wasn't just because that girl _said_ not to!

"Go back to sleep, Da-Chao. Your people of this generation will never see you again. Rest in peace."

"I WILL OBEY."

Da-Chao rose up from his knee, and sheathed his huge fire sword. He started walking toward the mountain, a perfect impression of Da-Chao's back and the very place for him to resume his silent watch over Wutai.

Yuffie was practically pulling her hair out. She in no way wanted Da-Chao to leave the scene without finishing Strife. She tried to raise her voice loud enough in protest for the mountain god to hear, but she thought she wsn't loud enough. Everyone else, on the other hand, pretty much got the hint she was being ignored. "You mean THAT'S IT! You get ONE attack blocked and you throw your hands up and walk away!" She hot-headedly ran out, right underneath the giant feet of Da-Chao. Her father wisely tried to get her to come to her senses and stay where she was, but she was too furious. It was no use. She ran to catch up to the giant. She started to kick his stone feet in a ridiculous, fruitless effort for attention, further making a complete fool out of herself, cursing the whole time and squealing that Da-Chao should finish what he started. Da-Chao made no move to acknowledge her or her wild antics.

Godo, Gorky, and Chekov gasped at the girl's impetuosity. Shake snickered at Da-Chao's cool detachment. _Yup, that's the only way to handle THAT one,_ Shake silently encouraged Da-Chao as Yuffie continued to make a spectacle of herself at his feet.

The giant turned and sat, exactly as he had, before he was summoned. He was about to solidify into the mountain again, when it looked like...he forgot something? That was the only way Godo could word it in his mind.

The huge mountain-god turned his broad head and stared down Gorky, and the lackey was instantly shaking in terror.

Godo could have sworn he thought Da-Chao looked...hurt? The huge god's mouth opened. He spoke. "THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH MY FEET," he simply said, and those were his last words, before solidifying into the mountain, where he will remain for the next one hundred years or so.

Chekov turned to stone himself for a moment while he processed Da-Chao's last few words. He burst out laughing and pointed a finger toward Gorky like a child in a schoolyard that was making fun of his classmate getting caught by his teacher. "AH HA!" Gorky snidely laughed, "I TOLD you how to say the incantation properly! HAHAHAHAHAH! But NOOOOOOOO, Gorky, you had to go and insult his Holiness! HAHAAH! I told-"

"SHUT your insolent mouth, Chekov! At least *I* got to summon his holiness ONCE in my lifetime!"

It worked. Chekov took a half a second to absorb what had just happened. He realized...one hundred years! The God of Wutai will not answer summon incantations for one hundred years! "Oh, my god! I'll be dead by the time we are permitted to summon his holiness again! NOOOOOOO!" He went down on his knees and crawled over to Godo, like a lost puppy. "PLEEEEEZE, you've got to do something! I must summon Da-Chao! You promised!"

Godo tried to level with his advisor. He tried to babble something about trying to work something out, but nothing could console Chekov in his misery and humiliation.

_Utterly pathetic_, thought Shake.

As Chekov continued to grovel at Godo's feet, Yuffie ran right past the advisors and her father and continued on the meet Aeris, who had just risen from the ground, as she was finished healing Cloud. Cloud started to snore as he was recovering from the hard battle he had just fought.

Aeris was waiting for this. She noticed Yuffie running toward her, that horrible, red-with-rage look on her face.

Yuffie stopped right in front of Aeris. She took a moment to see if this was really the girl that had accompanied them for part of their journey. Yup, it was her all right.

"WHY did you do that? WHY did you embarass my town like that?"

"Maybe the only one who was concerned whether you won or lost was yourself!" Aeris countered. She left a little girlish giggle out.

"YOU sound like Shake! Why didn't you just destroy Da-Chao? After all, you yelled at him!"

"Yuffie...I gave my life so that the things on this planet would continue to exist. Would it make sense to turn around and destroy it as soon as everything is over?"

Yuffie surprisingly had nothing to say to her.

"Also, just like yourself. Would it make sense for your people to fight in a war and attempt to dominate the planet while they're still recovering from Shinra? Yuffie...please don't repeat mistakes. You have had a few perfect examples of what not to do."

"WUTAI WILL NOT BE EMBARASSED!" Yuffie shrieked suddenly. "Wutai can be a powerful place again! We will recover from the previous ruler! He was completely incompetent! He was the first one that set in motion the plan to make Wutai nothing but a tourist attraction!"

"And this previous ruler is...?"

Yuffie looked genuinely sad for a moment. Aeris had seen that look on her face before. She had always sensed the sadness in Yuffie. She was the only one who ever did.

"...My grandfather." She grew furious even thinking about him. She stomped her foot. "He was such an idiot! We had the most powerful magicians in the world and HE sent them away and banned magic! Even my own father didn't reveal his true power until just a few years ago! We had our own culture, our own traditions, and he pulverized them! The only thing that reminded Wutai of it's earlier, glorious days was the temple! And now we have those jerks Chekov and Gorky where we used to have ARMIES of magicians!"

Aeris listened with the utmost respect to her ranting.

Yuffie looked Aeris straight in the eye again. "My father is naturally a magical being. He was sent away because of that. I don't have any magic like him...but..."

"But what if you did...right?"

Yuffie was silent again. So this was the reason for her power hunger. "Nobody is gonna sent ME away. And I'm not sending ANYONE magical away, EVER! My father and I will become strong and have armies like Shinra! We'll avenge the years we missed out on being in Wutai because of my grandfather!"

Ah-ha, Aeris pondered. Aeris knew that do deal with Yuffie, it wasn't a matter of telling her what to do; tha had been done before to her and she had no respect for orders anymore because of it. It was more of a matter of asking the right questions.

"Yuffie, answer me two questions. How many soldiers were there in the Shinra army? And how many magical beings did you fight when we were all together?"

Yuffie looked dubious. She thought about it for a moment, and, after unsuccessfully coming up with an answer by counting on her fingers, she made her hands into fists and glared at Aeris. "Well, *I* don't know! hundereds? Thousands? And soldiers and monsters combined, I don't even wanna think about that number!"

"Thousands," repeated Aeris quietly. "Is that right?"

"Yeah." Yuffie took a step back and crossed her arms defiantly, a puzzled look on her face. "SO?"

"How many people did it take to defeat them?"

Yuffie started counting on her fingers again, thinking of all the people in Cloud's troupe that defeated Shinra and Sephiroth. _Let's see, there's ME, first and most important, Blonde boy, that brunette bimbo, the goofy red talking mutt, this girl, that irritating wimpy big guy with the gun-arm..._

When she had her answer, she opened her mouth ready to speak to Aeris, but Aeris shushed her by putting a finger to hr lips. Her voice was barely a whisper. "Yuffie...sssshhhh. Don't answer me. Answer you own heart." Small sparkles fell from her form, and it looked like she turned into a Mako-green mist, which was pulled into the materia still in Cloud's sword.

_Nine people,_ Yuffie answered herself, since now there was no one to answer to. _Nine people against an army of thousands..._

When she found her father and underlings staring at her frm the distance between them, she snapped out of her thoughts. "GET MOVING!" she ordered them, letting an arm fly off to the side, pointing in the direction of the temple. "Get him to the prison below the temple and take that weapon away! NOW!"

They did so. Cloud's body was gathered up and Gorky stood over the Ultima sword, ready to pick it up. The blade, now a blazing white again, crackled with electricity.

Yuffie heard a familiar sound and turned just in time to reprimand Gorky. "DON'T touch that! Use a belt or something to carry it! We're not hauling YOUR butt all the way to the temple, too!"

She watched Gorky fumble around, trying to figure a way to drag the weapon along without touching it. Something started to bother her. _Nine people_...


	16. Chapter 16

Chapter 16.

Tifa Lockhart had almost moved everything back over to the bar, where her original place of residence, and her heart, were located above. She didn't even last two days of living in the hotel before getting a severe case of homesickness. Also, she hated the thought from the beginning of just hiding from someone as immature as Yuffie Kisaragi. There really wasn't much stuff to move, as she and Cloud brought only the most bare essentials over to the temporary shelter. They really thought this mess with Wutai would blow over quickly enough for them not to need anything that was too bulky to lug through six sectors of the city. The only thing that made moving back a real pain was that she ended up having to do it herself. Barret had already called her once, almost immediately after Cloud left, and she felt she needed to tell him she was moving back. Barret wondered where Cloud was in the decision, but Tifa couldn't but help making a little white lie, saying he told her it was fine. Barret shrugged his shoulders, unseen to Tifa over the phone, totally unsuspecting of the real situation and the night's events. He did offer the help of his daughter for Tifa to move her and Cloud's things back to Sector Nine, but Tifa felt it wise to refuse, saying that would definitely put Marlene in danger.

She looked around the room, and made a mental to-do list before making her final checkout. She got most of the paperwork transferred, so the only few things now were to check whether the cupboards and shelves were empty, clean this carpet a bit...and oh yeah, take down the five or six knick-knacks and mementos from the display shelf by the window Tifa manged to tuck in the boxes of paperwork before she and Cloud left so she'd have something small and familiar to remind her that this is all just a passing nightmare, and not a permanent turn of events.

She went to the kitchen, making sure the countertops were spotless. She was a methodical worker, making one particular area of concentration was absolutely perfect before moving on to the next; a lot like how she chose to learn her martial arts from her admired teacher, Zangan. She brushed the cupboards with a hand to check for anything she might have missed; nothing showed up as telling her she needed to go over the countertops again. She peeked in all the cupboards; nothing there, either. And after making sure she opened the fridge to check in there one last time, it was time to pack up the little treasured knick knacks and sweep.

She made her way into the living room, and to the display shelf on the wall where her little dustcatchers were. At least that's what most people would make of them; Tifa considered these as good as photographs for remembering all the people most important to her in battling Sephiroth. There were only a few here. The full amont of them would probably fill up a wall or two, as they did in the living area above the bar.

First, she took a relatively large letter "H" from the shelf. This is what Cid had given her. In escaping Holy's ascent from the center of the planet years ago, there were many parts of the _Highwind_ that never made it out of the crater. This was almost one of them. The letter "H" had broken off from the control panel and was almost going to fall, when Cid barely caught it. Tifa was nearby, and Cid presented her with it as if she had been in some sort of piloting class, and this was her graduation diploma. She kept it as a reminder of Cid and the strnage and wild adventures they had with him in the motley crew that Tifa, Cloud, Barret, and others formed.

The next was a shot glass, given to her by Jessie when Tifa first opened the _Seventh Heaven_. Wow, Tifa thought, it was a long time since she thought of Jessie...and the plate that fell...She felt awful for not thinking of Jessie in so long. She had a hard time holding back tears.

And then...what was this? OH! The two spraypaint can buttons! The little parts with the hole that the paint shoots out. Anyone else would definitely call these junk, but to Tifa, they were a part of Biggs and Wedge. She laughed out loud. When AVALANCHE was first formed and officially named, Biggs and Wedge were worse than teenagers...they immediately bought a can of spraypaint each and literally pained the town red! In graffiti that said "AVALANCHE!" and "Shinra will go down!". They were out all night sneaking around, spraying graffiti on things until the cans were empty...they each then cut off the top of the spraypaint cans and gave them to Tifa. They called their little gifts "Symbols of the Outspokenness of the Frustration of the Midgar Public". At least that's what Biggs called it. Wedge just thought it was something fun to do that would annoy Shinra.

Marlene's gift to her was next. It was a little clay figure she made, actually not too long ago. It was supposed to be a...uh...dragon. But Tifa didn't mind that it looked more like a lumpy greenish Dachshund with toothpick fangs. This little statue really reminded her how truly young she was, even though she had her dad's street smarts and could immediately tell when something was fishy.

Next, was a small, elegant red vial, the same color of Nanaki's (formerly called Red XIII) red fur. In it, some earth from the feet of the petrified body of the hero Seto was stored. Tifa considered this vial very sacred, although the rest of the small things she pondered over were no less sacred than this. Nanaki had given each fighter a small vial like this. Cloud must have had his still back at the bar.

That seemed to be it. This was the last box to go. Then she'd check out and be back at the bar in no time. Oh, by the way she needed to check on Sunrise! Poor thing...she hated forgetting about Sunrise, but the animal should have food in little hideaway makeshift stable for a week or so.

She picked up the box and was ready to exit. However, looking out of the corner of her eye, she noticed a drawer of the desk hanging open. Needed to take care of that. She put down the box tiredly, and went over to the desk, and gave the drawer a shove so it CLUNKed closed.

Or did someting CLUNK in there? She opened the drawer...she thought she had everything, and an almost visible question mark rose above her head. She looked inside...

She gave her own forehead a good SMACK! The box for the engagement ring! She forgot about the ring. Where was the ring? Oh yeah, she got mad at Cloud the day before yesterday and...well...

Grrr, she hated herself for doing that to him. She had to find that ring. It was too expensive and too precious to just leave around.

After searching the floor and under tables and chairs and other furniture for almost an hour, she was ready to give up. Until she saw a glimmer in the carpet. Oh, it was blue, maybe someone else lost a stone out of a ring or something. She'd bring it to the desk and ask the manager of the hotel if he'd had anyone ask about it recently. But maybe it was just glass...never mind, she had to go inspect it just becuase it was glass didn't equal that it couldn't mean something to somebody. She went over. The closer she got to it, the more briliantly blue it shone. _What an unusually pretty color for a sapphire!_ she thought.

She kneeled down and picked it up.

She couldn't believe it.

It was her OWN ring.

But...but...the stone is..._blue!_

_OK, _ she thought, _maybe it's the rug._ She held it up to the window. Blue. She rubbed her eyes. Blue. She put it on. The damn thing was still blue!

There was no way that Cloud could have taken it somewhere and gotten the stone changed...that would have taken a lot more time than a day. And he was gone that whole time!

She put it back on for convenience, completely puzzled. Oh, she wanted to check on Sunrise. The last box and this crazy ring will have to wait.

She made her way out the door and into the alley that hid the small shed, keeping Sunrise from thieves and other wrongdoers. She tried to warble to get Sunrise's attention befoore opening the door, but she laughed at the terrible sound that came out of her throat. A chocobo she wasn't. She could never imitate that warm, almost purring sound a chocobo could make when it was content.

Sunrise usually warbled back at the horrible attempts she made, but no answer came back this time. The first thing she though of was a thief! She ran the three or four steps left to get to the door, tore the door almost off it's hinges, and to her horror the bird was GONE! She looked everywhere for a clue, maybe the thief dropped something, or rubbed against something leaving a clue...but nothing.

Except the fact that the Ultima sword was missing.

Cloud changed the stone in her engagemenet ring overnight without being there, and then stole the chocobo with his weapon? Didn't make sense. None of it made any sense at all.

A ring in her pocket. Not her engagement ring, but the ring of the PHS.

She answered it. "Hello?"

"YO, gurl! Where is he?"

"Oh, Barret, I have no clue!" She suddenly remembered what was said before Cloud made a hasty exit two days ago. She angrily asked, a hand on her hip, "He wouldn't happen to be with YOU, would he!"

"Nuh-UH!" He sounded like Marlene there. "I got no clue! Ain't that why I'm askin' YOU? Can't even call his PHS. Must be offline or somethin'."

"Well, he said he was going to make it over your way to discuss something two days ago!"

"I never seen 'im. Guess he ditched us!"

"You've...haven't seen him?"

"Nuh-uh."

Tifa had to scratch her head at that. Usually when Cloud said he was going to go somehwere, he made it there. "Well, Barret, this is weird. unrise is gone, so is the Ultima sword, and the stone in my engagement ring was changed overnight!"

"What 'chu talking to me 'bout that? I got no no clue what's going through his mind!" Vincent must have been with Barret for some reason, becuase suddenly in the background she heard barret yell, "EY, Valentine! Get on the horn here. Tifa says stuff's gone all funky over there."

She heard some scuffling and suddenly a smooth, elegant voice answered. "Tifa?"

"Vincent! Where's Cloud? I'm getting worried now!"

"Tifa, calm down. What did Barret mean when he said things were going all wrong over there?"

In the background Tifa heard an interjected correction. "FUNKY! Ah said funky!" To which Tifa heard a whispered "whatever" from Vincent.

"Well, Sunrise, or golden chocobo, is missing, the Ultima sword is gone, and Cloud changed the stone in my ring without being here!"

"Hmmmm. Let's try to figure out the ring, as I think that may be the most important thing here. I think I can figure out the other two."

"HUH?"

"You said it changed color? Overnight?"

Tifa shrugged. "That's what it seemed to be. I mean, I..." She had to stop, and almost didn't start again out of embarassment. "I sort of...yelled at Cloud and threw the ring away, then he left to go meet YOU guys, so he said, then I found the chocobo and the sword missing! And he hadn't come back at all. I found the ring to have a different stone in it, but...Cloud wasn't around to take the ring anywhere. How can you get a stone changed overnight!"

Vincent took in all the information and continued to roll it over in his mind. "Tifa, the original color was white...now it's blue...the Ultima sword..."

Tifa didn't see it quite yet.

"Let me put it this way. Remember seeing Aeris in the cave we visited a second time?"

Tifa had a real chill run down her spine. How could he bring up THAT at a time like this!

I think I remember Aeris saying something about the ring. She said 'Keep an eye on that ring'. I think she might have done something to it."

She hmmmmed. She sort of remembered something about Holy and the ring, but she was going through a horrible emotional rollercoaster with what happened to Cloud, and making sure he was comfortable was her main priority at that time.

"Do you see the connections? There's no way that stone could have been changed overnight...meteorite stones are never found in a blue color form, and they certainly don't ever change color..."

Her eyes grew wide as she realized what the color of the ring meant.

"The Ultima Sword...!"

"Yes. Your engagement ring now has the same energy-sensing properties as the Ultima sword."

"OH MY GOD! That means...the sword...a battle...the chocobo...this Wutai nonsense...He must have snapped and gone over on a one-man army mission to Wutai andwegootastopimbecuasehe'sgonnagethimselfkilledand...!"

Vincent though that perhaps letting Tifa figure all this out wasn't very wise. Oh, well, she was bound to find out anyway.

She was red with fury at Yuffie more than anyone else...except herself.

"I'm going to call that little runty bitch RIGHT NOW and give her a piece of my mind and get Cloud back!"

She almost had the PHS hung up from being connected to Vincent's line when he SHOUTED, very un-Vincentlike, "TIFA, DON'T HANG UP YET!"

Vincent must have made Barret jump about ten feet in the air.

"Cloud specifically said that Cid was to run things while he was gone...but we'll need to borrow the _Highwind,_ as confronting her directly with this might prove even more dangerous to Cloud than sneaking in. I feel we should fly there, get him out ourselves, and return him here before asking her what's going on. That way at least we'll all be together if Yuffie decides to make any threats. I will contact Cid. We'll take Barret along with us. I will call you back right away."

Tifa was clearly shaken, even just hearing her voice over the PHS. "O...OKay."

"I'm calling Cid right now about the _Highwind_. Try to remain calm until we can stat our journey, alright?"

"Y...yeah. Alright."

Vincent disconnected his PHS from Tifa nd started dialing the number for Cid.

Barret was busy making other calls on the phone, trying to control the flood of calls suddenly coming for Cloud. As there was no one yet at the bar to answer the calls, they had to go to the next person in line. Cid was most likely not interested in playing phone tag with oter midgar officials, so Barret had to bear the brunt of it. He saw Vincent dialing another number on the PHS and used every once of self control to gently remind him of the start he recieved when Vincent raised his voice with Tifa. "Yo, Vincent?"

"Yes, Barret?"

"Dammit, lemme know when you're gonna drop a bomb like that so I can clear outta the damn room first!"

Vincent rolled his eyes and hoped Cid was available to ask for use of the _Highwind_.


	17. Chapter 17

Chapter 17.

In the midst of the evening, a horrible sound filled the air in the small, homely settling of Rocket Town. It shook the walls and it made the doors clatter against their frames. It made heads turn and wonder at it.

Except Shera, of course.

"Cid, you have a high priority call from Vincent."

No answer.

"CID?" Cid's snoring was so loud it could be heard in the street outside. He was so deep in sleep that he would be a person that would be impossible to rouse.

BUT...Shera knew all the tricks of the trade by now.

She cupped her hands around her mouth, hoping that Vincent would understand the delay (by hearing the grating of Cid's snoring through the phone, of course) while she tried the trick that ALWAYS worked.

"_Cid, the _Highwind_ is on fire!"_ she whispered.

Cid LEPT up from his chair as if Shera had stuck a beehive in between the cushions. He looked around, trying to find the nearst window, and, running to it, plastered his face onto the glass, where he could see his "Lady Luck". But, um, it was fine.

Cid turned away from the window, squinting from the light and rubbing his head, tryingt o get the blood flowing into it. "WHY do you always do that? Every damn time..."

"Here you go, Vincent." said Shera simply, then held out the PHS to Cid, her burning silence making Cid think twice about his reaction to the necessary alarm.

Cid hung his head low. "Um, sorry." He recovered and took the phone from her hand gently, and Shera retired to the kitchen to make Cid a good shot of highly caffeinated black tea.

Sitting back down on the couch, trying to fix his hair in vain, he addressed the person on the other line with his usual grace and tact. "Yea, so...whaddaya want?"

"We have an emergency. Cloud has been missing and we have evidence that he's in trouble, therefore, we ask you help us find him using the _Highwind_."

Cid started at the work "trouble". "THAT STUPID KID is ALWAYS in trouble! What the hell's his problem now? He's like one of those nightmares that happen over and over and over..."

"So you'll do it?"

Cid yawned loudly. "Nah, I got too much, uh, work to do here. You can come by an' pick it up. I'll have my man, Phil fly 'er fer ya." He smiled to himself as he straightened up and vainly adjusted his shirt collar. "After all, *I* trained him myself, so he's pretty trustworthy. Besides, he know's I'll rip his ass off if anything happens to Lady Luck!"

"We shall be on our way to Rocket Town immediately. Are there some spare item on board we can use in case we have smething cast upon us? We have no Materia or Phoenix down anymore so we've only got once chance to come back alive."

"Yeah, there's lots of stuff on board I never sifted through...help yerself to whatever's there. Some of it's so old I don't even know if it's any good anymore."

"Alright. We are on our way."

The call ended, and the captain half-threw the PHS back on the coffee table in front of the couch upon which he sat. He flopped back down on the couch, spread-eagled, with a leg and an arm drooping of the edge. With a smack he brought a hand to his face and gave his eyes a good rubbing as he muttered. "Damn kid. Always getting in trouble and we hafta bail him out. Sounds like a bad plot to a story or somethin'. I should get paid more for the work I do around here."

The greasy, snake-oil salesman weaved in and out of the crowd in the Wutai marketplace. A foreign man to Wutai, but able to sweet talk anyone into anything, he made his living out of swindling and making himself appeal to anyone of any nation. He adjusted his black top hat and smiled at all the pretty young women going by. A perfect gentleman, until the moment he leaves. Then, and only then, do his victims realize that what's missing has been taken, and they realize much too late to do anything about it. He has never failed once in his continuous attempt to scam people out of their Gil. He was a full time con artist; a man obsessed with improving his skills so to bring the most profit with the elast effort.

He was looking throughout the market to find that "something" he can bring to the people as the cure for all diseases, the answer to everyone's love life problems, and the newest One True Way to make sure those who are lonely find true love and happiness. But it would all be due to his words, not from some form of magic or research. He utilized the power of the placebo to the utmost, and his words were almost as magical as Materia.

He went from stand to stand, leaning over tables, talking to merchants, looking for the Next Big Hit. It was a typical day of inquiring and evaluating.

He stopped at one stand and casually inquired about some fancy jewelry that was laid out before him by the merchant.

"So all of these things are made of pure copper, eh?"

"Oh, yes!" The proud coppersmith answered. "Copper is just as beautiful as gold! It is a metal that is ignored by the fashion industry. It's warmish color can go with amy other metal or warm colored wardrobe, and it's cold metallic shine is a perfect accessory for any wardrobe based on cool colors. So you see, it truly is a versatile accessory!"

The man in the suit and top hat acknowledge with a strong nod of his head. "Certainly! It is a lovely color when it's pure. Very beautiful. But you know what I heard about it?"

"What, sir?" The young coppersmith asked.

The man leaned forward in an attempt to keep his next bit of secret information as confidential as possible. "I HEARD...that this metal..." and he further lowered his voice, "...has _magical properties_ to heal any disease known to makind!"

The coppersmith looked incrdulous. He threw his head back in a laugh. "Yeah, RIGHT!", he snorted.

The swindler knew wthis would take a bit of "convincing". "Sir, I speak the truth!" He motioned again for the young man to lean forward again. "Really! I have heard legends that certain metals were infused from the creation fot he Planet with certain materia, which gives the metal it's color to begin with!"

The coppersmith was interested. Materia WAS magical, so there wasn't any reason NOT to believe in magic, after all.

His tempter continued. "People really don't realize how different metals affect them when it's placed in, say, jewelry or something! In fact, there are ancient stories in places such as Wutai where people brought the magical properties out of metals before the first piece of Materia was even discovered!" he picked up a bracelet and used it as an example of his story. "I mean, why would people be drawn to a certain natural material to begin with? After all, we wear *metal* jewelry, not granite or slate jewelry! And why? Because there was something, according to researcher's opinions, that _drew_ people TO it! And to this day, we still wear metal jewelry, constantly drawing out the powers it contains, because the very metal has the power to draw those that need healing to the answer..the metal itself!"

He put the bracelet down. "I'll tell you what. Here's my business card. You can page me anytime if you'd like to find out more about this reasearch. And I'll be more than willing to make a deal with you to make a *truly successful* venture out of your already compassionate service!"

He gave the young coppersmith a fancy, multicolored business card. The coppersmith ran his eyes over it, and thoughtfully regarded the man with the top hat. it was a tempting offer, and he knew that. Very good. The bait is placed.

With a tip of the hat the man in the suit walked away from the stand. Turning away, he stopped in the midst of it to see something shimmering in the alleyway behind the stand he was just visiting. At first he blew it off, thinking that the coppersmith had some stock or something in the alley, and that's what he saw shimmering.

But why would it be out in the open in an alley, and not in storage boxes or something?

He looked more closely, squinting his eyes. No, this was a golden glow from something in the alley. And it was moving! With a childlike fascination of anything shiny, he headed toward it to find out whatcaught his attention.

He got closer to it. it was...an animal? A huge bird-like thing. An ostrich? Nah. He stopped dead in his tracks at what he beheld. It was...a legendary golden chocobo!

_Wow!_ Thought the man. He approached the bird and gazed at it as he stroked the bird's beautiful feathers. _This...this is amazing! These birds are only stories in legend books!_ The bird definitely had an owner because there was a harness on the bird's head. He thought for a moment that maybe the owner of the bird was around, so he craned his neck around, looking for anyone who might be following him, or coming down the opposite side of the street where the beautiful bird was found. He smiled evilly to himself. _Ah, well...finder's keepers_, he thought. He then had an idea. A brilliant idea worth a million Gil. _Ohh, yes. Finder's keepers inDEED!_


	18. Chapter 18

Chapter 18.

Aboard the _Highwind_, the threesome were hotly debaing the best way to enter the Wutai territory, and how exactly to get Cloud out. Phil interjected once in a while what he could do with the _Highwind_, and the team had to figure out something they could accomplish, taking such things into account like how close they could get to Yuffie's town before their presence will be known, ways they could hide the _Highwind_ once they get there, or whether the airship should be in the vicinity at all. Phil thought it would be best if he dropped them off, and left before anyone recognized the airship and reported back to Godo they had arrived. The most important thing was not to get discovered too early.

They knew they were clearly at a disadvantage because the magicians of Wutai, and even Godo himself, were magical beings; they didn't need Materia to cast spells and transform. After all, when Yuffie was originally challenged to a battle of honor by her own father, he had the ability to transform into many things, all without the use of materia. Yuffie didn't inherit his powers of transformation persay, but her keen ability to sense the location of various Materia probably was a version of her father's power, and the fact she was such a successful Materia thief proved her power of location was definitely a strong force.

Although Yuffie's underlings didn't have Materia available, Vincent especially wanted to take no chances. And even though it was obvious that Godo's court was full of buffoons, in a way them even _more_ dangerous because of their innate magical power, and not less dangerous. A weapon wielded in an unwise hand can sometimes be more deadly than one held in a knowledgeable hand.

Tifa, Vincent, and Phil bounced idea off one another in hopes to bring up the best plan. Something was missing, Tifa noticed. Something odd. Realizing what she missed, she turned to Barett, who was casually leaning against the nearest wall, his huge arms crossed over his massive chest.

Tifa smiled at him, and sweetly said, "You're pretty quiet for once, Barett!"

"I ain't got NUTHIN" to say. NUTHIN'. Y'all go 'head and make yo' plans. Those magicians probably know we comin' already."

Tifa crossed her own arms defiantly. "Well, I'm surprised you haven't suggested we all 'bust in through the front door 'with the _Highwind_!"

"HUH? What 'chu talkin' about? Why do that?"

"Well, you certainly liked the idea when we needed to infiltrate the Shinra tower ooohhhhh, a while back."

"I ain't sayin' a word. Not a word 'bout that."

"Alright, whatever you say, Barett," Tifa chuckled as she humored him.

Barett suddenly pointed an artificial finger at Tifa, and his eyes narrowed. He made his voice more gruff, to bring across his point. "But look, girl, I ain't goin' up a hundred flights a' stairs like tha last time, either!"

While Cloud was out of commission, Yuffie ordered her underlings to bring the Ultima weapon into a private room. She was determined to get the white Materia out of that sword, and tried for hours to pry it ot with all sorts of different tools. The project was even more complicated because whenever she got close to the surface of the sword, she could feel the electricity building up, ready to zap her into next week if she even brushed it's surface.

After trying so long to remove the white Materia, Yuffie finally had had enough. All sorts of tools littered the ground around her. Knives, metal rods, wooden dowels, scissors, pocket knives, and even forks and spoons from the kitchen! Frustrated, she sank to the ground, defeated by the stubbornness of the weapon in front of her.

She was brought out of her thoughts by the door opening. Gorky had a brought another bucket of potential tools for his Mistress, as he had been ordered, into the room.

"Mistress..." Gorky started, trying not to gasp for air too much and therefore embarass himself and his Misttress. he had been running around the house and Wutai for hours trying to find something by which Yuffie could extract the materia successfully; and everytime a pailful of things he brought didn't work, Yuffie, pouring over the weapon, would order him to go and find something else that WILL work.

_Stupid idiot_, thought Yuffie. _A magician and he can't even find a tool to get a stupid piece of materia out of a stupid weapon!_ She wanted to say something snappy and rotten, but was too tired from concentrating, mostly in trying to avoid getting zapped into next week, to do so.

A quick "WHAT?" was all she could muster.

"Mistress, these are the last couple of things I found. I...don't think they'll be much good, either...so.."

"DAMMIT, Gorky, you're a magician! Are you sure you don't know any hocus-pocus to get this materia out?"

"Yes, Mistress."

She snapped her head away. Her jet black hair flew out in all directions when she did so. "Dammit. The most powerful materia in the universe, more powerful than the Knights of the Round, and we can't use it." She added a few more curses as she clumsily got up from the ground. "Where the hell is Chekov? I need to ask him if he has any spells. He better think of something."

"M'lady, Chekov said he felt the need to meditate. He felt it was absolutely necessary, and he felt something approaching the vicinity that could give us a problem."

"WHAT! The most powerful materia in the galaxy is right here in the room and that joker wants to MEDITATE!" She stomped toward the door, shoving Gorky out of her way. "I'll meditate his ass!"

Gorky followed his Mistress out the door, catching the door behind Yuffie just in enough time to prevent his nose from getting flattened, as she was so infuriated she pushed it hard enough, so it would haveslammed shut had it gotten that far.

She stomped down the hall, stomped up to Chekov's door, and...

Peacefully in meditation, in one part of Chekov's mind he in fact, was still concentrating on the room around him. However, another part of him was also sunbathing with bikini-clad girls at Costa Del Sol. _ Maybe I'll have myself a Del Sol Sunspray_, he thought to himself. _Or maybe a ..._

Click, SLAM!

Chekov leapt about ten feet in the air as his Mistress, his very, very angry Mistress, threw open the door, letting it hit the cupboard of book behind it. The cupboard was hit so hard the book were knocked to the floor. Plop, plop, plop, plop-plop went five books as Yuffie's raven black eyes demanded an explanation for the sudden calmness of Chekov.

Silence filled the air. Everyone obesiently allowed the Mistress to speak first.

Only one word came from her mouth. Her tiny figure was a black silhouette against the golden glow of the lights in the hallway around her.

"...WELL?"

Chekov recovered, and started to speak. He was praying silent prayers to the Gods of Da-Chao that the Mistress was so lenient with her subjects.

"Um...er...Ma'am, as Gorky might have explained to you, I felt a terrible wave of something within myself, and I figured I should meditate. And while meditating, I had a vision!"

Yuffie silently crossed her armed and continued staring. Her screeching was deafening, but her silence was maddening!

"Um..." Chekov stumbled for words that did not have anything to do with bikinis or Del Sol Sunsprays. "Yes...I had a vision that a huge dragon of Wutai would drive away a flying wasp from the South, but the wasp dropped something important it was carrying, and the dragon ate it up!"

"Hm." Was Yuffie's only reply. _Daddy will have to interpret this_, she thought.


	19. Chapter 19

Chapter 19.

The plan was set. They had been traveling all night, and all morning. The _Highwind_ advanced toward Wutai at an alarmingly leisurely pace. It drove Tifa not just "up the wall", but also over the blades of the _Highwind_ and down the other side, too. But it was necessary as to not attract so much attention to the airship and let on to anyone that may have been doing Wutai's air traffic control on to the fact that the occupants of the ship had such an important task to perform.

"Wutai is in sight, Mr. Valentine", said Phil as the airship came closer to the exotic town aeemingly inch by inch. Phil's sudden declaration broke everyone out of thinking about the plan they had all formulated...and wondering if there were any holes in it.

The plan was to drop the three rescuers in three different places, meet up at the Turtle's Paradise Bar, do some hopefully unobvious tourist-like"costume shopping", and sneak into the most obvious building were Cloud could be imprisoned...Godo's Pagoda, on the north side of town. As insane as it sounded to infiltrate Wutai in broad daylight, it also made sense...the whole idea was in effect to steal Cloud from right under Godo's and Yuffie's noses before any of them realized he was gone.

"We should have our first dropoff in approximately five minutes, Mr. Valentine", Phil said, keeping everyone up to tabs timewise.

"Good job, Phil." In an unusually talkative mood, Vincent continued after much thought. "Do you see? There was nothing to worry about at all. Cid would be awfully proud of his personal trainee if he would have seen you fly through those unsteady winds we had earlier. The heat of this continent makes for extremely unstable flying. It proves your experience, my friend."

Phil practically blushed, then brushed off Vincent's compliment with wave of a hand. "Aaaah. It's nothin'. I have to say, though, that I *did* graduate at the top of his most recent flight school class, so I always had the feeling I was cut out for this kinda thing. Wonder if the Captain 'll give me a promotion when I get back to Rocket Town!"

Barret suddenly stepped forward from listening in to the conversation, uncurling his massive arms from his chest. "Yo, look, it's our first drop off point there..." he pointed to a tiny forested area ahead with an artificial finger.

Tifa was unusually quiet and tense for the last half hour or so. She waited impatiently by the rope ladder which would lower her down to the ground for even longer. When it came down to deciding who would be dropped off first, Tifa immediately said she'd be the first to go, and no amount of arguing from Barret or sense from Vincent would convince her otherwise.

"We're here, Miss Lockhart", announced Phil. He brought the _Highwind_ to a hovering full stop and helped Tifa throw over the long, long ladder towards the ground below.

Tifa grabbed the ladder without a word and started to throw a foot over the side, her long chain of dark braided hair blowing almost straight out from the combined force of the airship's massive blades throwing air down, and the air currents rising from the heat of the ground.

Yuffie, her father, and the three wizard attendants, Shake, Chekov, and Gorky, stood on the small outcrop of rocks that overlooked a tiny patch of forested area outside of Wutai.

"This IS the right place, you are sure,..._RIGHT_, Chekov?" Gorky asked his loaded question to Chekov without even turning to face him, a broad smile on his face.

"_YES_, Gorky...it happens to BE the correct place", said Chekov, also without looking at Gorky. "...And I will pay _scrutinizing attention_ to the correct pronunciation so I may have an impeccably successful summon!"

Gorky got the hint. He snorted. "Hmph. Third-rate summon." He snidely retorted.

Infurated, Chekov turned to Gorky. "Why you insolent, blasphemous fool! Every day, you're starting to sound more and more like..."

He almost let it slip. ALMOST.

Both of their pairs of eyes flicked over at Yuffie in unison. Usually when she overheard conversations she was the first to step in uninvited and defend herself. But she seemed rather distant and...sad...this morning.

Yuffie tried to sigh as noiselessly as possible. What a crappy start to the day for her, indeed. The first thing that set the whole day in a bad direction was the dream she had last night. The same dream she's had for years...ever since that night her and her father, and every magic user, whether they were materia salesmen, magical item traders, or even wandering healers like hermits and priests, were exiled from Wutai. The same night her grandfather issued a decree that every magical animal within a mile of Wutai was to be slaughtered. And Wutai was made into nothing else but a tourist attraction.

_"But WHY do we have to leave Wutai, Daddy?"_

"Because your grandfather needs some time to think, dear."

"YOU'RE LYING! He doesn't like magic or anyone that uses it! He hates you and me!"

"Hahahahaha dear. I don't know. He's just sad over what happened to his daughter, your mother, honey."

"But that was an accident! She didn't know how to work the materia you gave her and it backfired! She said so and she forgave you before she died!"

"I know honey. But your grandfather thinks differently..."

_"Daddy, when are we going back home?"_

"When your grandfather passes away, dear. He is very sick and very old...we might be going back within a year or two. We must be patient."

"Let's bring back some materia! We can use it to make Wutai great again!"

"What? Dear, what are you talking about?"

"Magic made grandfather afraid of everything, and made Wutai lose ALL it's beauty and power! If we can get ALL the materia in the world, just think! We can made Wutai strong and beautiful again!"

"Hm...Magic caused the problem and magic will fix the problem. Alright, I like your idea, dear...We'll search for EVERY piece of materia on the Planet, and when we have it all, Wutai will be proud of us and proud of itself! Dear, we will be the first and greatest of what will be known as...Wutai Materia Hunters...together!"

"Hahahahahahahahaha!"

"Hahahahahahahaha...!"

And then, after she was finished sobbing as her mind flashed back to the time in the dream when her, her father, and all other magical beings were kicked out of Wutai, there was the remaining problem of Aeris Gainsborough's questions. As she fixed her hair that morning, Aeris' questions thundered repeatedly in her mind, along with the answers, more loudly than ever.

_"Yuffie, how many people were there in the Shinra army?"_

"I dunno...hundreds? Thousands?"

"And how many people did it take to defeat Shinra? Don't tell me, Yuffie...tell it to your own heart."

("Nine people.")

_Nine people. Nine people._ Nine people...against armies of thousands, both human and animal. Oh, sure, Yuffie knew they had help along the way from many, including shopkeepers, scientists, and others they befriended in towns like Corel, Rocket Town, and Bone Villiage...but how many people faced that bizarre..._thing_... Sephiroth made himself into at the center of the planet? How many people fought Jenova over and over again, face-to-face?

Nine people.

Yuffie had to squash this down inside ever since she spilled her guts to Aeris. She shouldn't have done that. It was easy for the first day or two, but Yuffie realized it was just getting too hard to hide how she felt anymore.

Particularily, she found it less and less attractive to simply eliminate people who were in the way ever since she met Aeris, too. What was it about her? She was the single most powerful entity on the planet...but, she listened. Yuffie spilled her guts out to her and she listened. Perhaps it is wrong, after all, to just have people die so one measley area of the planet could get it's nose out of the dirt and find it's sense of self esteem again.

All this was intensified by the ominous way Yuffie's father interpreted Chekov's vision. he didn't say anything specific, but his excited "Dragon! That's perfect!" comment didn't make her feel too easy about anything. Yes, she still wanted nothing else but to rule Wutai when her old man was gone, and she wanted Wutai to be the beautiful and revered magic center it had been in the past, but she certainly didn't feel like killing anyone anymore to accomplish that. Maybe just giving Gorky, Shake, and Chekov a good chewing out once in a while will satisfy her instead.

"It's here!" said Gorky, pointing to the southeastern sky.

A loud whirring sound could faintly be heard in advance of the aircraft...as it approached nearer and nearer, Yuffie could see the vague outlines of a VERY familiar airship. It, indeed was the _Highwind_. It made Yuffie sick to her stomach to think about how anyone could stand getting from place to place on that horrible thing.

Chekov immediately opened the book and starting to chant something in the same language that was used to summon Da-Chao. It took a while, as he recited the strange verses deliberately slowly, and not without glancing menacingly at Gorky, reveling in his perfect pronunciation of the words.

All the while, the _Highwind_ was getting closer and closer to the ground, and the Wutai crew could see a long rope ladder dropped from the deck above.

"They're letting someone off, Chekov! Hurry with that incantation!" Godo prodded Chekov impatiently.

Slightly stepping up the rhythm of the words, Chekov continued to chant. And a blue-white light started to emanate from the little book he held. In seconds, a large cloud seemed to appear from the book, a blueish-whitish cloud, and slowly it began to take shape, in the form of a dragon about the size of a horse. The dragon's wings beat slowly and deliberately while it hovered above Chekov, and the hair of it's beard and it's tail seemed to blow in an unseen gale force wind.

Yuffie had no idea what spell was cast; she was so preoccupied with materia hunting, she never bothered to look in the spell books, besides the fact she couldn't summon anything without Materia in her hands anyway.

But Shake did recognize it. "You're using a wind dragon?" he said as he worriedly turned to Godo. "Don't you know how temperamental those things are!" Shake's worry wasn't necessarily about the dragon, persay, but at who was *controlling* the dragon. And these wind dragons could not be controlled by any idiot off the street.

"It said in the prophesy about a dragon, Shake...relax and just watch!"

Yuffie realized what was happening...the wasp...the dragon...and the dragon eating up something the wasp drops! It was all literal! Obviously the person getting off, which by this time Yuffie could barely make out to be Tifa, was in great danger from this dragon. Mind you, she wouldn't mind having Tifa as a prisoner but she certainly didn't want anyone to get eaten by a Wutai dragon!

Gorky smiled as the dragon's form continued to coalesce. "He looks hungry!"

Yuffie was horrified. The dragon stared at Chekov, waiting for orders. Chekov looked at the dragon squarely in its silvery eyes and pointed with an outstretched arm, wordlessly, at the approaching ship.

The dragon turned to fly off toward the airship.

"Oh, NO you don't!" said Yuffie, and she ran toward the dragon, which was about to lift off. She tried to grab on to it's wings, but only got a tip of it's tail. The dragon pulled Yuffie off the ground right along with it!

_So THIS is what I get for developing a damn conscience!_ Yuffie cursed to herself. She held on to the animal's tail for dear life, watching the ground spinning further and further away from her feet. She could feel herself getting airsick already.

Tifa was on her way down on the ladder when Phil noticed something...bluish?...approaching the _Highwind_. He barely got a word out when suddenly at the bow of the ship, there was a small dragon hovering in front of them! And to their even greater suprise, a young girl was frantically clinging on to the dragon's tail...and to the *greatest* surprise, that girl was no one other than Yuffie Kisaragi!

Barret Wallace was thorougly amused. He made a fist out of one meaty hand and smacked it into the other..."We'll get 'chu, mah pretty...and yo' lil' dog, too!" Barret threatened as he grinned a mouthful of white teeth, which stood out menacingly in contrast to his dark ebony skin. Wutai has some of the best magical resources on the planet and they send a dragon no bigger than a horse to do their work for them? No problem, for the _Highwind_ crew!

"_It's stonger than it looks, you jacka-!_" Yuffie tried to shriek above the roar of the blades on top of the airship. But the dragon was starting to openit's mouth, from which poured a horrendous gust of wind. The wind was so strong that the airship struggled to maintain it's hovering position. Even Vincent were plastered to the deck for dear life. Phil, hanging on to the wheel with one hand, revved the engined up to Full Speed Ahead to counter the dragon's strong wind attack...but there was so little room to move because of the wind, it was impossible to do anything else.

Barret realized that Tifa hadn't come up from the ladder...she must still be hanging there! Barret practically had to crawl along the floor to keep himself from being blown away, and held on to the rail for dear life as he tried to call to Tifa. "TIFA! GET YO' BUTT UP HERE NOW!"

But stubbornly Tifa held on to the rope ladder in spite of the fact of getting knocked from left to right against the sides of the airship from the wind. "I'm alright! I'm going down anyway!"

Barret was furious...the wind dragon poured out more and more wind, and the airship couldn't take much more before getting literally blown away. "YOU IDIOT! You gonna fall that far to the ground!"

Tifa looked desperate. "CLOUD IS DOWN THERE!"

The ship was starting to fall back from the strength of the dragon's attack. While the dragon was relatively stable in the air, Yuffie started climbing up the large, horn-like rigid scales on it's back so she could try to get closer to the dragon's shoulders.

The ladder Tifa held on to was starting to slowly brush the tops of the trees below as the craft was forced backward. Tifa knew it was now or never, so she gave Barret one last desperate call. "I'LL PHS YOU!" and she let her death-grip of the rope ladder go.

Down she fell.

Barret helplessly watched her fall. He furiously slammed his artificial fist into the railing, making a huge gouge in the wood. "YO' JUST AS BAD AS HE IS, YA FOOLISH GIRL!"

On the deck of the _Highwind_ Phil could smell something. "The engines are burning out! We won't be stable for too much longer! Hold on!"

In a final blast of concentrated air, the tiny dragon's attack sent the airship reeling backwards. Pieces of it snapped off and blew forward, towards the bow. Barret made a hole in the deck with his artificial fist and held on to that. Vincent dug his claw into the wood with one hand, and held on to Phil by the scruff of his neck with the other after Phil had been blown off the wheel and toward him.

The airship spun out of sight.

Now that it's work was done, the dragon could concentrate on getting rid of the unwanted passenger on it's back. Yuffie, after finally reaching the dragon's shoulders and seating hersef on them, had tried to reach back and get her shuriken out, but found out really fast she was too afraid to let go of a hand to do it. Besides, what good would it do to kill the creature a mile and a half above the ground, whils she was still on it?

The dragon whirled and corkscrewed Yuffie around, trying to dislodge her. Yuffie tried to hold on to the dragon's neck for dear life. She thought she might use her feet to try and "steer" the monster toward the ground by using her feet on it's wings, but the constant moving by the dragon around and around wouldn't let her get a good grip on them with her sneakers.

The dragon dove toward the ground, spinning and spinning faster and faster hoping it's unwelcome rider would remove herself. When that didn't work, It started flying towards the spot where Yuffie saw Tifa fall any way, hungry for a meal, but this time bucking and rocking like a wild horse.


	20. Chapter 20

Chapter 20.

Tifa fell through the tops of the trees, ready to go unconscious from all the energy that was lost while trying to hold onto the ladder. The next thing she remembered was not hitting the ground...rather, she opened her eyes to find herself hanging by her belt, which was miraculously hooked on to a not-too-sturdy looking branch of a tree she passed on the way down. A few seconds of kicking and arm-waving resulted in the branch snapping, and releasing Tifa from her unwelcome perch above the ground. She hit the ground hard.

Nothing seemed broken, but she knew she'd be sorry later on in the day, which is when everything would finally catch up to her. She woozily picked herself up fromthe ground after examining herself, and tumbled into a lovely sunlit clearing. She managed to take a few stes forward, reassuring herself that she'd make it all the way to Wutai. "I'm gonna make it...gonna get to Cloud...gonna make it...gonna..."

And PLOP, she fell back to the ground unconscious.

Yuffie was barely holding on while the dragon zipped through trees, somehow still managing to deftly avoid them while at the same time trying to buck Yuffie off.

As sick as Yuffie felt, she would get to Tifa before that dragon did. She didn't want anything happening to someone who could possibly help her figure out how to use that materia in Cloud's sword, but she also felt she owed something, somehow, to Aeris, and sparing Tifa would be her repayment.

The dragon headed straight for a tree with blinding speed. In the last instant possible, it shot off to the left, attempting to hurtle Yuffie off with all it's might and ingenuity.

It worked. Yuffie just couldn't hold on anymore, and dropped to the soft forested ground below.

The dragon, now free if it's rider, headed after its target. Realizing Yuffie as one of its potential masters, the dragon forgot about her for now, and headed toward it's intended target, Tifa, which the dragon could see was laying unconcious in the sunny clearing ahead.

Yuffie managed to somehow wake herself up, and stumble after the dragon, quickly headed toward Tifa.

The leaves crunched under the small dragon's feet as it walked on all fours toward her. It slowed, and finally stopped, positioning itself right above Tifa. It put it's head close to her back.

Yuffie could see the dragon wasn't attacking yet, but while it was stalling Yuffie circled around silently in the brush, true to her ninja training, so to get a clear shot if she needed it. She unlatched her giant shuriken from her back.

When the dragon's face was in full view, she could see a long, pink forked tongue running up and down Tifa's back, leaving dragon slobber in it's wake. The dragon was taste-testing it's victim!

Yuffie didn't know which made her sicker...getting a rollercoaster ride bareback on a flying dragon or seeing someone getting slavered over by one.

She saw the dragon open it's mouth to reveal two rows of sharp teeth...it was crunch time!

Out of nowhere Yuffie's shuriken flew out, swirled around the dragon, and was deftly caught in the young girl's hand.

"I missed ON PURPOSE I'll have you know", said Yuffie, addressing the dragon. "Get out of here and return to that spellbook or I'll hit you with it for real!"

The dragon wasn't impressed. It reared back on it's hind legs, hissed, and once again, opened it's mouth, intending to snatch Tifa's body in its jaws and fly off before anything could be done about it.

Yuffie threw her shuriken again as the dragon's mouth headed for Tifa. It spun around the dragon again, cutting once deeply into a shoulder, and, as the dragon's head turned in pain, it gave the animal's snout a good deep cut, too.

That was enough to send the dragon turning on its tail. It screamed in fear and pain, flapped its wings a few times, lifted off the ground, and zoomed off in the direction it came from.

Yuffie ran toward Tifa's body. She then patted her down, tring to find a radio, or a PHS, or something to remove from Tifa lest she wake up anytime soon. She threw it in the air and deftly destroyed it with her shuriken. She then took out her own PHS and called her father.

Godo was puzzled and furious all at once when he realized who called him. "YUFFIE! WHY on this planet did you do that? That was insane! What about the prophesy?"

"Prophesy Shmophesy, dad! You should have consulted ME before you thought up a crazy plan like that!"

"What's that supposed to mean! Don't you want Wutai to be strong again?"

"I do dad, but..." and she lowered her voice "...what if there's a better way?"

"What's that...oh, no..the..the dragon!"

It sounded like a loud roaring over the PHS. Yuffie tried to get someone to answer by calling out random names, but it sounded like the phone hit the ground and there was no one nearby to answer her. The dragon obviously didn't take too long to get back to where it belonged, namely, the incantation book, but it wasn't quite over the two deep gashes Yuffie gave it either.

There was a lot of yelling, and finally it sounded like someone picked up the communicaion device.

"Yuffie...we have a problem." The voice sounded like Shake, to Yuffie's irritation.

"WHAT?"

"Your father...the dragon...before we could seal the dragon again, it got a good clean attack at your father...he's in bad shape."

Yuffie's mouth dropped open. Incompetent idiots!

But she had to stop for a minute...SHE was the one who started the whole thing...she was the one who went to her father about the prophesy, and she was also the one who knew she was attacking an extrmely temperamental dragon, and enraged it so badly that it would attack its own masters! _It's my fault! It's all my fault!_ kept shooting through her mind.

She tried to hold back tears long enough to say to Shake with a broken voice, after a long shocked silence, "Well...make sure he-he's attended to. And as soon as he's s-set, get your a-asses back here and take Tifa prisoner."

She was just about to hang up without a goodbye when she heard Shake ask where to put the new prisoner.

"I DON'T CARE WHERE YOU PUT HER!" she snapped. "Just put her somewhere and keep her under surveillance until I figure out what to do with her."

She shut off the communication. Then she started to sob again. What a crappy day.

In the blazing sun, in the heat of midafternoon, the three men stood far away from the craft. They had all managed to meet together, checking the damage to their persons, which they found to be minimal to none.

They silently, frustratedly, surveyed the damage.

"Quite a rocky ride," said the first.

"Looka the size 'a that gouge in the ground. Ain't gonna have an easy time fixin' the damage from that," said the second.

"Looks like we are back to square one," again responded the first.

The third said nothing, but his lips started to tremble and his eyes watered. Eventually he needed to drop to his knees, and pounded his fists against the dry earth. The first man felt sorry for the pathetic pilot; the second was clueless.

"Whass yo' problem?" asked the huge man with the artificial arm.

The man sobbing on his knees held up his fists to the sky and cleared his throat long enough to explain before falling back down sobbing again.

"THE CAPTAIN IS GONNA *KILL* ME!"


	21. Chapter 21

Chapter 21.

Tifa's vision consisted entirely of dark blue and greyish colors, mixed inbetween what she could only identify as something that would be shadows if she could see them. Snapping to a fuller sense of awareness, she was starting to appreciate how much of a beating her body took... _Took when?_ she asked herself. _Oh, yeah...the fall...the _Highwind_...the ground...ow!_

She tried during this time of reminding herself what transpired before she blacked out, to lift her head off the...what was she lying on? A bed. A really thin, uncomfortable, stinky, cheaply made bed.

Then she realized. A prisoner's bed.

_Prisoner...arrrrgh...Cloud better appreciate this...And when I get a hold of him..._ She rubbed the places that were sore and tried to move a couple things to make sure they weren't broken. Sure, Zangan had trained her how to fall as one of her very first lessons from him, but the fact that things were bruised and not broken, this time, could only be attributed to dumb luck.

Holding her sore head, she picked herself off the mattress and took a few faultering steps around the room. Her vision now cleared, she could see this was a room made of regular-sized bricks, once red but now blackened through age.

She had to assume she was in Wutai, held by Yuffie as a prisoner, but had never seen this room before...and she and her friends had done a lot of poking around in Wutai while trying to track down Sephiroth.

Instincts learned from her whole experince as a captive of Shinra, and wisdom from Zangan, started to whiz by in her head. "Awareness is half a battle won", Zangan used to say...he meant awareness of self, physically, mentally, spiritually, emotionally, all of that. Along with the practical advice of knowing your surroundings before getting into deeper trouble by your enemy knowing it more than you...

This cliche sparked her thoughts as to figure out a way to implement the knowledge it teaches. _I'm in a prison cell! How can I possibly know my surroundings more than my enemy in a prison cell!_ Tifa reasoned. _Well, maybe there's a clue around here somewhere...I'll poke along the walls and maybe a former prisoner left a scratched note or someting as to what to do._

Tifa started running her fingers along the walls, trying to pass over every single stone for some sort of noticeable indentation, or anything else that would provide some sort of clue as to how to get out of there in one piece. Starting at the wall with the large iron door, she worked her way through three walls with nothing turning up of much use.

On the final wall, the only place that was left was one corner. A very frustrated Tifa was starting to run out of options, and the option of just drop-kicking the next guard that came through the door was starting to sound like a very good one.

Running her sore fingers all around the last section, closer to the ground, she started to sense something important...looking though the layers of blackened soot, she could just barely make out some hash marks, chained together in sets of 5 by other hashmarks running diagonally across the other four. Someone was keeping track of their time spent here. _Gee, does each mark mean a day, a week, or a month?_ she sarcastically joked to herself.

Almost giving up, she felt another oddity in the stone. Feeling a sort of order to what seemed like engraved depressions in the stone, she took a closer look. There were four simple looking characters dug into one particular brick. H, 5, u, and a P?

Tifa considered. H, 5, u P. H5UP. Was it some sort of code? H5uq. Getting frustratd again, she put all the letters in different orders...maybe they were a magical password! Wutai is, after all, a town of magicians and humans with inherent magic skills. H5PU. PUH5. HP5U.

None of theser combinations made any sense...until she thought to herself, P, U, 5 H. PU5H. "Ush"? Ush.

It hit her like lightning out of a clear blue sky. "PUSH!" Written backwards, maybe there was something to this certain brick since someone actually did bother to write something on it. She wondered if removing this particular brick could have been used as a way for prisoners to communicate with each other, and pass tools and notes to one another, even while under heavy surveillance from the guards posted outside the rooms in the hall.

She touched the brick with all her fingertips, and pressed on the brick. With a scraping sound, it moved inwards about two inches!

Cloud lay down on the thin mattress, looking up, hands tucked under his golden spikes of hair. Having been mostly left alone for an hour or two, he had some time to think until the next guard that made the mistake of entering his cell alone came in. That sorry guard would most certainly get a pounding, Cloud thought.

Until then, he had a moment or two to consider all that happened to get him here. He wondered whether the ninja forces in Midgar were pulled back. Well, he'd find out when he got back.

He wondered if any of his buddies were dumb enough to come after him. He had to snort. His previous experience with the magicians of Wutai have really proven the strength of their abilities...without even using materia! Anyone that came to get him would definitely have to deal with some powerful magicians standing in the way.

Cloud shuddered to think what would've happened to the rest of the planet if Wutai had really succeeded in acquiring all the materia they were seeking. But knowing Yuffie and her moronic comrades, Wutai's main problem wouldn't have been _acquiring_ the materia; the conflict that would probably never be fully settled would be how to split all that materia between Yuffie and her lackeys!

And then, _she_ crept into his thoughts. He sighed. It was unavoidable. You don't know someone for over fifteen years and then just forget about them when they're not around. You don't propose an engagement, or at least _try_ to propose considering the circumstances, to someone and then act like nothing at all happened when it doesn't work out. Or do you?

He again asked himself the same question over and over, as he did hundreds of times at different points in the past few months: Do people love one another because they really are, at some level, meant to be together, or is love merely the result of a whole bunch of shared circumstances, and when those circumstances end, it's doomed to fall apart? He could never quite answer that question, no matter how many times he asked himself and no matter what way the question was worded.

The fact that he and Tifa were next door neighbors as kids was a circumstance. The fact that they happened to find each other in Midgar was a circumstance, and the fact that they all had to work together to find and defeat Sephiroth was a circumstance. Heck, it was a circumstance for all of them...Cloud would hate himself if he admitted considered staying around someone like Barett just for the quality time!

Cloud, in effect, figured that he had just rationalized his whole decades-long relationship with Tifa to circumstance. _Fine,_ he thought.

But he also kept asking himself questions about her...what was she doing now? How is she handling life? _If she comes to "rescue" me by herself she'll really GET it._

But do all these questions constitute...love?

Cloud sighed again. For all intensive purposes, the answer to that question had to be...

...*SCRRRAPE!*...

Cloud stopped breathing for a second, out of shock. He knew he heard something. Yes, he definitely heard something, and it was coming from inside his own room!

He got up off the matress slowly, and tried to pinpoint where the sound came from. Sounded like it came from the opposite side of the room, in the corner. Cloud slowly walked over to investigate.

It sounded like it came from relatively low along the wall...did an animal get in somehow? Cloud couldn't recall anything scurrying across the floor of the room, much to his relief and puzzlement.

Crouching down, sitting on his heels, he took note of the point from where he thought the sound came. He rubbed his chin as it seemed there was ONE brick slightly protruding from the wall. Something was engraved onto the brick, like H5UP or something or other, but Cloud wasn't concerned about that as much as what he just heard. Feeling along the wall, he didn't motice anything about the brick to make it any more special than the bricks surrounding it. Although it looked pretty "loose" from the wall.

Just for the heck of it, he firmly pushed the brick. It moved back until it formed a depression compared to the surrounding bricks.

And Cloud thought, "And that scraping sound...that was the same sound I heard!"

Even as Cloud was thinking, the brick popped out with a long _scrape_, seemingly by itself again!

Cloud was concerned. The next room to his was obviously another cell for holding prisoners; and the hole int he wall was most likely a secret way for prisoners to communicate while being virtually unseen, as long as their timing held out. Cloud resolved to himself that if the prisoner was a citizen of Midgar, and Yuffie was about to use him or her as some sort of way to force CLoud to join them, he had to get this poor prisoner out before Yuffie figured out what to do.

Cloud's voice was down to a whisper so the guards in the adjoining hallway wouldn't hear. "Pssst...hey...hey! You in there...are you a prisoner? Are you hurt? How long have you been in here? Will you need any help in getting out?"

On the other side of the wall, Tifa couldn't believe it. That voice, so concerned for another person, even while in tight circumstances like a prison, was so familiar to her.

She had found Cloud!


	22. Chapter 22

Chapter 22.

Tifa stammered as she tried to find words to say to Cloud on the other side of the brick barrier. "I...ah...uh...I..."

"If you're hurt or something let me know. If I have to carry you out I will," said Cloud, thinking the detached sounds coming from the other person were due to some terrible blow on the head or something.

Tifa was so insulted at the thought of being *carried* out of an enemy prison, she finally found words to say. It didn't matter that Cloud would do the carrying; Tifa always thought it was a sign of weakness to be carried like a helpless child. She angrily removed the brick from the wall completely and hissed quietly into the opening. "You WILL NOT be carrying ME out anywhere! My own two feet will get me out of here!"

It was Cloud's turn to stammer. "T...Tifa!"

"If anybody's going to do the carrying, it's going to be ME!" She crossed her arms defiantly behind the wall.

"What a coincidence," Cloud's icy remark wafted back through the small opening.

Tifa was caught way off guard. She wanted to apologize...really she did. But her mind returned to issues undealt with since they last saw each other, and the compulsion was too strong to just keep quiet about it. She'll apologize later. Maybe.

"Um...Cloud...I...found it..."

Cloud knew she was referring to the engagement ring. Having no intentions now of remaining engaged, he regarded Tifa's excitement with stony silence.

Tifa continued, oblivious to the fact that Cloud was tuning her out and far into thinking of a way out by now. "I found the ring! It led me to you, in fact...Want to see it?" She removed what was left of her left glove, the tearing claws removed by the Wutai magicians, and exposed her now glowing white Materia engagement ring. She put her hand delicately through the hole, and waved it around as she simultaneously whispered into the hole. "SEE! I'm so glad I have it now! I would have never known anything was really wrong the way you just stomped off like that back-"

Irritated at Tifa's henpecking, Cloud tried to stuff Tifa's ringed hand back into the wall by gently pushing it. "Tifa, cut that out," he whispered into the hole, "we have to get out of here first! This isn't the right time to discuss Midgar!"

Tifa wasn't about to change the subject. "WELL, at least you can't run off HERE!"

"Tifa, we need to talk about getting out of here!" Tifa could see that Cloud put a glowing blue eye in the hole where the brick was. The glowing blue eye of Cloud's shone out of the darkness of the recess in the wall, and glinted angrily.

Tifa paused. "Make me a deal."

On the other side, Cloud was so frustrated that he slapped his palms agains his cheeks and gave his face a good rubbing. For God's sake, this was a prison, not an auction arena!

Tifa couldn't see, but from the sounds Cloud was making she knew she had the upper hand, THIS time. "Alright, alright, alright. What's the deal?" came the exasperated reply.

"Tell me the answer to one question: why you left with Sunrise in Midgar, and I'll help you break out of here."

"Fine." Cloud gathered his thoughts that were running away, scattering between escape, engagement, the sheer coincidence of Tifa running into him here, and what to do AFTER they escaped. "Yuffie was threatening your life with the ninjas placed in Wutai. She demanded either I turn myself over or you...you die. So what choice did I have? I had to leave."

Tifa uncrossed her arms and leaned into the hole, hanging on every one of Cloud's words. "But why didn't you say anything? Why did you leave me to just hate you like that?"

"If I were followed, the ninja forces would find out. They were watching the whole time, Tifa. They saw our every move. I couldn't afford to tell anyone."

"But...well..."

"_Enough_, now," said Cloud icily. "That's two questions I've answered. Now we get out of here."

"Yes. Well... Well, fine." She crossed her arms again after hooking a stray lock of hair behind an ear. "So I would have to assume now that you actually have a *plan* on getting out of here. Right?"

Cloud mumbled a bit. "Uh...uhm...uh..."

"I'll take that as a no."

Cloud was silent. That definitely meant "no."

"How about," Tifa started out, "when the next guard comes in the door to feed one of us, we'll knock him out, take the keys and unlock the other door?"

"There's always two."

"So? I can take on two at a time!"

"But Tifa, the problem is, we have no reinforcements, no PHS to call the others, and we don't even know where we are! How about if we take the keys by less...obvious means?"

"And that is by...doing what?"

Cloud gulped. She wouldn't like this. "How about..if you...distract the guards and steal the keys while you're doing that?"

Tifa could have just grabbed Cloud by the scruff of the neck and stuffed him into the tiny hole in the wall they were talking into for suggesting that! Tifa never wanted to resort to "distraction". She had a shapely body, but when she used it, her fists talked a lot louder than any other part of it! It was completely repugnant to her to try to seduce a skanky prison guard into giving up a set of keys rather than giving him a good satisfying kick to the nose! "I. Don't. Think. So."

"But Tifa...if someone important comes along, and WE knock them into next week and someone noticed they're missing, they'll alert the whole building and possibly the whole city!"

Well, Cloud had a good point. She still found it a skanky idea, but they did have to leave everyone intact to have more time before everyone got suspicious. No doubt they would eventually be discovered missing, but making sure everyone showe up when they had to and weren't unconscious in Cloud and Tifa's places gave them more time for the enemy to discover something was wrong.

Even so, Tifa had another idea. "Well, when I get the keys off them, I'll slip it through this little hole before they realize it's missing. They'll come back here and find nothing, so they'll assume they lost it! We'll wait for them to get out of here them you can unlock us."

"Good idea," agreed Cloud.

"OK then...I'll...see you...soon..." She purposely put as long a pause between her words as possible to keep Cloud listening longer. She desperately wanted to add the words "I love you." She so badly wanted to say "I missed you." It took every fiber of her being not to say them and in effect distract them. She slid the brick back into place.

They heard footsteps growing louder, coming toward them. Tifa heard the sounds of keys rhythmically jingling in time with the footsteps. Then, metal scraping metal on Cloud's prison door.

_She better not hurt these guys too bad,_ Cloud thought.


	23. Chapter 23

Chapter 23.

Chekov was still hurting, after such a long time, that he was not the worthy magician to summon Da-Chao. Furthermore, his town's local supernatural power was miserably pathetic compared to that summoned girl. Harder to believe that one of the most powerful beings on the Planet was once a human that he had actually met in person ages ago when Sephiroth was still trying to destroy the Planet with Meteor! He couldn't fathom it! He did, however, sense something odd about that girl in the pink flowing dress with bright green eyes as soon as he had met her. She scared him so much he had to ask Godo if he could hide behind the curtains in the library for the next two days!

The prison guard walking with him had the most unpleasant experience of unwillingly commiserating with him as they walked down he prison halls toward where their two prized captives were housed. The guard rolled his eyes and cleared his throat once in a while as Chekov rambled on and on and on about Da-Chao and how his boss, ZYuffie, was so totally absorbed int he illness of her father she pretty much hermited herself in taking care of him. Strange that Yuffie would suddenly be so interested in taking care of another person after giving every impression that she'd never stop being a completely egotistical teenager and spoiled brat, for anything. But Godo's illness was truly devestating to her.

"But even so, *I* felt that if I could not summon His Holiness Da Chao, I should at least be given the opportunity to interrogate the prisoners!"

Collak rolled his eyes. As he approached the blonde prisoner's door he took out his set of rusty keys.

"But I just...um...don't have the energy to..eh..interrogate them right now", Chekov said as he remembered that both his prisoners were top notch sparrers, and would most likely beat his sorry butt to Instant Magician Pudding in a blink of an eye. "So...I will settle for taunting them a tad and then YOU will quickly throw yourself in front of me and close the door if you see them taking a step towards me! Hahahahaha!"

Collak rolled his eyes as he opened the door to the man's cell. Time to feed the prisoners.

The blonde man was seated on the floor, next to the wall, seemingly contentedly daydreaming. He looked as though he was almost calmly expecting company rather than sitting in a prison cell!

Chekov barged in as soon as the door was open. "WELL? Have to decided to divulge whatever information you're keeping from us about that weapon and that materia?"

"Let's see..." Cloud cockily rubbed his chin as he gaze fell unfocused on the wall oppisite him rather than to his "guests" to his right. "Nope. Still don't have anything new to say." Cloud stood up and defiantly faced his captors.

"Well," said Chekov smugly, wringing his hands, "we'll approach this in a new light." He leaned into Cloud and whispered his information in confidence. "You see, *I* was trying to talk Miss Yuffie into sparing your life," Chekov started as Collack made a face and rolled his eyes. "And *I* suggested that we take you under our wings here in Wutai."

Cloud tried to lean away from him.

"You see, Mr. Strife, *I* highly value your many talents and abilities. *I* suggested to Miss Yuffie that we offer you a highly valued position, should you accept to work for us. So, what say you, _Viceroy_ Strife?"

Cloud didn't even have to think about the answer...but he also didn't think about the words he used either! "Work for a dimwit like you! You must be kidding!"

Chekov was taken completely aback! He visibly jumped at Cloud's cutting words. "Collak! What are you doing just standing there? Hit him!"

"I can't hit him while holding these keys and two Prison Pack dinners, sir." Collak didn't really want to hit anyone. He was just interested in bringing his paycheck home for his wife and kids and taking his vacation soon, ready to get away from simply working as an underpaid grunt in a prison that rarely ever had any prisoners.

Frustrated, Chekov waved all of it away with a hand and decided to think of something later to deal with this. "Never mind...I'll still leave the offer on the table for you. Collak, give him his food and we'll move on!"

Cloud was ravenously hungry but refused to open the white styrofoam "Prison Pack" brand dinner. He watched Chekov and the guard slam the iron door shut, secretly almost hoping now that Tifa _would_, in fact, beat them to a pulp. He would do it out of necessity; she, however, would enjoy it!

Chekov and Collak made their way down the dank hall, where a short distance away the female prisoner's door stood. Collak turned the key in the lock and opened the door...and there she was, beaming from ear to ear! Collak had thought he never seen such a...happy...prisoner. Or such a pretty one either...in fact, her smile was VERY pretty...

"Hel-_lo_ boys! Tifa grinned fakely, albeit seductively. "I'm so, so _so_ happy to see you!"

Collack was puzzled, but pleased! Chekov was pleased, but puzzled!

Tifa ran up to the very tall Collack. She leaned in close...very, very close. She gave him a perfect view of...well, of what she needed him to see. "You see, I was so _scared_ and lonely in that horrible cell I never knew if I was going to see anyone ever ever again!"

Collak blushed stupidly. He forgot his place as a prison guard and offered Tifa the packet of prisoner's food as if it were a dozen roses on a first date! "I...uh...brought this..."

Tifa feigned complete happiness when presented with her little "gift". "Oh, for ME?" She said with a sickening sweetness. "Oh you shouldn't have! You know, why don't you join me so we can all..._share_?"

Tifa ran in the cell and sat on the bed, holding the pack of food, and her two captors sat on the floor at her feet, ogling her like two lost puppy dogs. She brought out a plastic fork and temptingly asked, "Now...who wants to get the first _scrumptious mouthful_?" She cutely pursed her lips. Chekov and Collak drooled. What was better than having a nice romatic dinner with a willing pretty girl?

"_I_ should be first! I am the boss!" snapped Chekov.

"Ma'am, I think I should be first..I do more work and less pay, and your attention is more than enough pay!"

Tifa put down the fork and the food container and stroked each of their heads. "Wow, so nice to have two _big, strong men_ fighting over little old me! Why, I'm so flattered I could just..."

Her grip on their hair tightened. Her face, angelic and luscious, became twisted as Tifa clenched her teeth...and she brought their heads together with such a CLUNK that loud in the prison cell next to her heard the sound.

Tifa let go of both of their heads and they slumped to the ground unconscious. No, that wasn't quite the plan but having to act like she annoyed her too much to keep up the charade more than once.

She grabbed the keys from the guard, and leaving the two men in the room, closed and locked the door behind her. She opened up Cloud's door and waved him out.

Cloud was speechles, but he still made his way toward the door to Tifa. "But I thought we said...!"

"Yeah, yeah, I know. But judging how completely stupid they are, I'm sure we'll have enough time to find our weapons and slip out!"

Cloud smiled to himself. He couldn't help but thing how cute Tifa was when she got things accomplished. She was just like that...always steadfastly faithful to one objective until it was perfected, or completed...be it a childhood friendship, an engagement, or escaping out of a prison.


	24. Chapter 24

Chapter 24. Note: This chapter is dedicated to each and every person who totally kicked my ass in the past two years to finish this. Thanks everyone. I wish I had some of your emails to reply to you personally, but my computer was hit by lightning on May 14 and I had no computer for 3 months. I lost ALL my emails in the process of getting a new one.

Cloud and Tifa hurried silently down the hall to a door. Opening the creaky door, they were presented with a room, and a staircase leading upwards. Tifa ran up the stairs first; another door barred their way into the next floor. However inconvenient the door was, it also barred anyone from seeing their escape too quickly also.

Tifa put an ear against the door and concluded that no one could be heard. Opening it as carefully as possible, they finally got a view of what seemed to be the main room. Cloud finally recognized where they were...they were in the large temple-like pagoda slightly west of Wutai, where Yuffie had fought her own father in a battle for honor so long ago!

It was a fairly easy trip to the front door, but they first had to find their weapons. To their immediate left, wrapped around the wall, is where they knew they would find another set of stairs leading up. Most likely their stuff was in an upper level.

Silently making their way up the next set of stairs, and into one of the rooms, they found what seemed, very strangely, to be hundreds of kitchen tools and other gadgets lying about the floor. Screwdrivers, knives, hammers and chisels, every type of tool imaginable was strewn on the floor.

"I see Yuffie still doesn't know how to keep a room clean!" hissed Tifa under her breath. Cloud silenced her with a roll of the eyes and they made their way over to where the tools became more and more concentrated and abundant on the floor. At the area of the room where there were so many tools on the floor that the carpet couldn't be seen, they found what they were looking for...the Ultima weapon.

It stood supported by each end by what looked like display case pedestals.

"I can't believe they left this unguarded!" whispered Tifa, this time with real curiosity instead of the the cattiness to which she regarded Yuffie.

"Maybe the guard you had to knock out was doing some kind of double duty today," Cloud offered in explanation.

As Cloud picked up the sword, Tifa pondered. "Not a smart thing to do. Betcha Godo's too cheap to even pay him more!"

Cloud couldn't help but lean closer into Tifa and whisper softly, laughingly, "No wonder the employees hate their jobs so much! They could be at a resort taking in the sun at Costa del Sol and here they are doing two jobs and getting paid nothing but worthless Gil!"

They both chuckled to themselves over their inside joke. Tifa noticed how lovely Cloud's eyes were in the dark, now hat he leaned close enough for her to see them clearly. To any other girl, she was sure, poor Cloud would be considered a freak of nature, but she loved how his eyes glowed softly in cerulean shades in the dimly lit room.

They made their way over to a cardboard box where they could see the Premium Heart glinting. She picked it up, strapped it on, and Cloud was more than ready to say, "Alright...let's bust outta here!"

Making their way to the door, Tifa stopped Cloud by pulling gently on his black tank. "WAIT!"

"What? Do you hear someone coming?" Cloud asked urgently, as he could have sworn didn't hear any noises out in the hall. He thought he was losing his hearing.

"No...but that weapon..you can't just go walking around Wutai with that weapon! We need to hide it! Let's get one of these rugs and roll the sword up in it..."

"Tifa, that's nuts! How are we going to go sneaking around the wilderness round here with a sword in a rug!"

"Because we're not going to go sneaking around in the wilderness. We're heading toward the marketplace by the dock and getting lost in the crowd!"

"I hope you planned out what we're going to do in the marketplace."

"We could rent a buggy, find a PHS and contact Cid to pick us up!"

Cloud sighed. Tifa got a small but sturdy Oriental rug and presented it to Cloud. Cloud grudgingly took the rug and wrapped it around the blade. Throwing it over his shoulder, they again padded their way down the stairs to the front door. The bare room seemed to take an eternity to cross.

Making their way through the cool, forested, cherry-tree-dotted trail that led from the temple pagoda to the main part of town, Cloud tried to balance the rug-wrapped Ultima weapon on his shoulder. That was relatively easy, as he was used to its incredidble size and weight. However, trying to figure out what to do with the girl walking next to him was not so easy.

Having the Ultima weapon so concealed brought out the devil in Cloud. Tifa had to laugh out loud more than a few times as they tried to make their disguise as rug peddlers as convincing as possible. Cloud asked so many people, "Wanna buy a rug?" that Tifa was in fact a little worried that someone _would_ call their bluff and try to buy it!

When the rug joke got old, Tifa was the first to speak up about the most obvious uncomfortable subject looming above both their heads. "I'm...I'm glad I didn't lose my ring."

Cloud was silent. He really didn't know what to say.

Tifa continued. She seemed undaunted by Cloud's reaction this time. Usually he'd make her furious when he had nothing to say...but now she seemed to have changed. "You know, we should reschedule. You know...what we were supposed to schedule. Sometime."

His head spinned. He could never get the nagging question out of his head..._Now what? Now what? Now what?_ "But what are we supposed to do when it's all over?"

"What's over?" Tifa honestly asked, thinking surely he didn't mean Sephiroth. Sephiroth was dead and gone, so what else was there to worry about?

"When the adventures are over. When there's nothing to do. When there's no Wutai to harass us, or no construction to do on Sector Seven...when there's no practical purpose to be together anymore?"

Tifa ws clearly miffed. "What does that mean!" was her exasperated response to Cloud's words. Her eyebrows knitted together, she intended to get in Cloud's head.

"Well, it was years between the last time we saw each other as kids, and the moment I ran into you after being in the Shinra army. Since we've been back together, it's been nonstop action. We've been together as long as there was something going on...Sephiroth, then the journey to meet Holy in the crater, then being in prison together...what about when it's all over? Are we together just because we went through a whole bunch of stuff together? And had no choice for company but each other? Is that really going to make it last? Is the fact that our lives haven't stopped for a moment since we were kids due to Sephiroth, Shinra and Jenova."

Tifa was silent. It was all so true. Then the crisis with Tifa's desire for children, her never thinking about Cloud in the meantime. She knew she tended to beat that subject to death, so didn't want to mention anything about that particularly sore subject when escaping Wutai with their lives was their first priority.

There didn't seem to be any buggy rental agencies in the immediate area. In the past, Wutai was so heavily inundated from magic the people never quite needed them, as they simply cast a travel spell. However, after the previous ruler of Wutai strangely and suddenly removed all magic, the simple villagers like those Cloud and Tifa passed by on their way suddenly had nothing. Now travel was mostly done by bicycle or rickshaw...at least, seemingly, right here by the port where everything needed was readily available through the marketplace. Not a good method to escape a countryful of semi-powerful, spiteful wizards.

"So come to think of it, how did _you_ get here!" Tifa asked, puzzled. Then she remembered Sunrise's sudden disappearance back at Midgar. She grew slightly disturbed and said to Cloud in a cutting whisper, "Where is she? Did you go and leave her somewhere!"

"Relax. She's a big girl. She's just as capable of helping herself as any one of us. The experts at the chocobo ranch couldn't even believe how strong she is." Tifa figured that that was true. Sunrise's excellent breeding made sure she was strong enough to deal with anything. She wouldn't even be a golden chocobo is she weren't. Gold feathers on a chocobo was a sign of complete health and top condition; for the large birds, it wasn't simply another color, like a dog's fur or a fish's scales.

Cloud scanned the dock, into which the tree-lined lane they traveled on terminated. A cargo ship, with burly men loading and unloading the entryway. A crowd of teens laughing and trying to impress one another bragging about their illegal Mah Jongg gamblings activities. An old fisherman intently minding his own business at the far, far end of the pier, beyond the length of the ship.

The wind was picking up from the west, and this would mean swift travel to the ship's easterly destination, as cargo ships usually traveled to unload souvenier supplies to Midgar.

"That ship..." Cloud murmured distantly. Tifa understood, and agreed stowing away was the best thing to do right now. With no way to communicate with the others back home, traveling to an unknown destination for help was better than staying in Wutai, where there definitely wasn't any help at all.

The two of them, as inconspicuously as possible, padded their way closer to the ship. It seems the muscled men taking things in and out had a lot of work to do; they disappeared and reappeared at fairly regular intervals. Moving as one, Cloud and Tifa timed the men going in and out, and hurredly stole aboard.

Quietly, they made their way forward to find the cargo hold...or at least somewhere where they could hide. Making a few turns, they spied the boiler room, and an empty storage space next to it. Perfect, at least for now. They went inside to wait, and while inside, they found the room filled with tools and mechanical equipment.

It wasn't long before a few crew members came down the hall, cursing loudly about the hard work and saying how they have to make sure they had the proper papers so when they get to Bone Village, there would be no "issues" like last time. One man, who seemed to be the person in charge of getting the cargo transported, was complaining to his buddy about when the ship he last loaded at Wutai was sent on a while goosechase all over the seas to get to proper documents to disembark. Wutai was known for its inefficiency and incompetence when handling world affairs ever since all magic was removed from it years ago.

Now that Cloud and Tifa had an idea of where the vessel was headed, they decided to sleep A good recharge was necessary...just in case getting off the ship didn't go as well as getting on.

The solitary fisherman on the end of the dock was probably the only person to notice the two stowaways, due to the hustle and bustle of the busy dock. But he didn't care. His life had nothing to do with the cargo ship. He strung another worm onto the end of his line with his crooked, wrinkled, but still deft hands and cast it in the water. He tipped his straw hat against the increasingly strong breeze. "Hm. Storm a-comin'."

The man in charge of the cargo move and his second in command took the stairs to the deck. There stood the captain, and his virtual bodyguard...a deadly Master Tonberry. The captain previously had exchanged his protection for half the oil on the ship to the Tonberry, as the little demon was in desperate need of fuel for his cursed lamp, and the little creature's protection was even more respected now that there was so little cure magic left on the planet. The disappearance of healing materia made people shudder in terror of Tonberrys, which made them common protectors of ships, and found in other areas where business could be done to acquire more lamp oil. The men exchanged a few words while the Tonberry was characteristically silent.

Finishing their business, the men left the captain and his ship's guardian. Passing by the door, the lead man grunted to the other that since the engine was working so beautifully, they probably wouldn't need any tools until the tune-up at the Bone Village dock. They shut the door to the equipment room, which made one of Tifa's eyes half-open cautiously at first. When she saw no one had entered and in fact the door was shut, she fell fully asleep.

Inbetween heartbreaking-sounding sniffles, Phil diagnosed the various internal and external problems of the airship. There was no moving the vessel right now; the damage was too extensive. Vincent tried comforting Phil, saying that even Cid probably would have ended up grounding the ship, but this didn't work at all. Phil would have to leave his flying license, his badges and all his time and effort training under the crusty pilot at Cid's front door. Vincent realized that trying to make Phil feel better was of no avail; so instead, he thought of ways to get out of the forest...by any means possible. There HAD to be a way.

The skanky storyteller eyed the beautiful golden chocobo up and down. _This bird is easily worth millions of Gil...but not all at once...but feather by feather!_ he thought. The bird cooed slightly as she pecked at some bread crumbs and seeds on the concrete ground.

The storyteller approached the bird carefully, hoping to act the part of a caring person, bothered by the bird's horrible, terribly, TERRIBLY *neglected* condition, and bringing it home with his excellent chocobo wrangling skills where it could provide money...whoops, where HE could provide excellent care for such a mistrated and abandoned creature.

"Well, helLO there, you beautiful moneypit...I mean...magnificently rare creature!" The chocobo looked up confusedly, but uninterestedly, at the man for a moment, but soon lowered its head again and continued pecking.

Finding the bird to be extremely tame, the con artist stood in front of the much-larger-than himself bird, and turned on his best sweet-talk. Animals were innately stuipd, so he figured, and the sweeter he was, the more willing the bird would be to come home with him, where he'd promptly pluck his feathers and sell gold-feather-stuffed pillows to unsuspecting people who would believe in its magical healing properties, pay millions of GIl, and make him filthy rich. No strings attached. He even had the disclaimer written on the "Do Not Remove This Tag!" tag attached to the pillow thought out..so no one could possibly sue him. If they ever figured out he was a total fraud and his healing pillows really did nothing.

The chocobo still cooed softly. The con artist was assured he's simply be able to take the bird's conveniently provided harness, and lead it home. So extending a hand, he finally reached the bridle, and grasped it...as hard as he could. He crudely jerked the harness, and the delicate neck of the bird was tugged in the man's direction.

Sensing the human leading him had no experience in dealing with his own kind, and afterwards deciding the man also smelled awful, the bird instinctively pulled back and tugged the man's arm forward, away from the direction where she was being led. The man though his arm would come out of his socket. Amazing that a bird could be so strong!

Much tugging ensued, back and forth, the con artist getting more and more desperate to take the bird home, and the bird even more willing to stand its ground.

"Stupid beast!" The con artist hissed in exasperation. "Stop being so like an ass and start...ACTING...like...a...CHOCOBO!"

With an angry squawk and a deafening high pitched whistle, the chocobo pulled back on the reigns away from the scary man one last time. His hand was yanked off the reigns. "DAMMIT!" the con artist hissed again. The chocobo landed one well placed kick, and the con artist fell to the ground, clutching himself and trying to ease the searing pain in his family jewels.

The bird made a run from it, breaking the tiny rope Cloud used to attach the reigns to a nearby pipe. Cloud used a thin rope on purpose; he had no doubt of Sunrise's ability to find her home from any place on the planet...and while he wanted to make it clear to her she needed to stay where she was, he also wanted her to escape if things ever came to this. She was not just a pet, but also a special part of the tight-knit group Cloud and his friends shared; and since her specialty was running, he'd rather her run back home than be injured.

There it was. That ominous ring. The PHS. Phil cowered and sweated as it rang. _It's the Captain. I know it's the Captain!_, he thought to himself as he watched the light flash on and off and heard the awful sound. _He knows we're in trouble and he's gonna be sooooooo pissed when he finds out i messed up his ship!_

Barret had had enough of listening to the PHS ring and lost patience waiting for Phil to answer it. "Damn PHS! I'm gonna answer that whether ya like it or not!"

Phil tried desperately to stall the big guy from answering. In spite of arguing that all he needed was a few more minutes to fix the ship, Barret picked up the little device and pressed the receiver button.

"Yo, sup?"

Even Barret had to hold the speaker away from his ear as a booming "THE HELL IS GOIN' ON THERE!" came out. The speaker could barely handle the volume.

"'Eeeey...chill, man! We're having some technical difficulties with tha ship."

"And the hell does THAT mean!"

"Phil here crashed it."

Phil turned a thousand shades of grey and white, and fell over in an instant; he recovered just as quickly, and snatched the PHS from Barret's hand.


	25. Chapter 25

Chapter 25.

"CAPTAIN!" cried Phil. "Captain, it was impossible to keep the ship steady! That little dragon was pulling hundreds of knots on the ship! It was impossible! It really..."

"SHADDAP! Get yerself together. You're startin' ta sound like Cloud." Barret could hear Cid clearly on the PHS even though it was not to his own ear anymore. Cid really needed to use his "cell phone voice" and not his "outside voice".

"Yessir."

"Put the big guy on the horn."

"Yessir!" Phil immediately and unhesitatingly handed over the PHS back to Barret.

Cid continued. "Hey. Cloud's chocobo is here. Somehow she found *my* door. I thought that wasn't cool, since she's got something against me and all, so I decided to call the kids and there's no answer from either one of them. So I decided to call YOU people and you go and screw it up." Cid had second thoughts about the way the conversation was going. He paused for a minute. "Sorry. Well, is everyone OK?"

Barret's face grew more than a few shades angrier with every thoughtless word Cid said. But after hearing Cid apologize, he decided he didn't have to mess him up. Until he got home and relaxed a while. "Yeah, man. Gotta admit the control room's pretty well padded. Ship's pretty busted though."

"I can ride the bird there so I..." Cid had to temporarily cut himself off due to the deafening screeching made by the chocobo. Obviously the chocobo didn't care for Cid too much and objected to having him as a passenger at all. Cid continued where he left off, but the squawking continued. "...uh...so I can...sheesh, I'm SORRY!...What the hell else can I do?" The squawking temporarily stopped. "...so I can look it all over myself when I get there."

"Do we really have the time to sit aroun' here and wait fo' YOU?" Barret asked impatiently.

"I can home in on ya from at the house, 'cuz I got plenty of tracking equipment for my baby here. Yanno, if youz all end up going to Wutai, I'd like to be there. I know there's some pretty strong bad karma left in Wutai, so it's better if we go together." He paused sadly, and and then added quietly, almost crying, "...and..I...I really wanna see how bad she is."

Barret let out a sigh. "Whatever, man. See ya in a few. Bring ya marshmallow toaster with ya. I got no doubt we can take on Wutai's entire army ourselves, when we're all together."

Both men clicked off their respective ends. Cid turned towards the bird. Sunrise never liked Cid, but as she knew where he lived from CLoud's journeys with her, and she grudgingly went to him anyway when there was no where else to go. If looks could kill, Sunrise would have blown Cid away, mustering up the angriest look her beak and big blue eyes could accomodate.

"OK, look...I know you don't like me, but you're the fastest transportation I got to Wutai right now. Can't we discuss this? Man to...uh...man?"

The pretty bird cocked her head to the side, and made a half interested murmur of a whistle.

Yuffie sat cross-armed and cross-legged in Godo's room, staring out the window at nothing in particular. "Don't disappoint me, Dad," she said, "you're stronger than that."

"Dear." Godo didn't want to agree, and therefore lie to her; and he didn't want to contradict, upsetting her further either. Through many layers of bloody bandages, he leaned back, reclining on the soft pad on the floor and smiled. "The flowers are so lovely in the garden, aren't they?"

"..."

"The manicured gardens aren't the only thing that make Wutai beautiful, Yuffie."

Her voice lowered. "Don't get sentimental on me...father."

"You do, too."

"..."

"You're everything you were meant to be, Yuffie. Just as you are. You're a beautiful girl."

"I'm a thief. We're all thieves. We're all a cheap thrill for the tourists. Even worse than Costa del Sol. We're all incompetent, undisciplined, desperate materia hoarders."

Godo chuckled to himself. She sounded just like her mother now. "Sometimes that's just what you have to be, dear."

Yuffie was intrigued. She slowly brought her head around to look at her father for the first time since he woke up.

Godo leaned back again with a grunt. He was saying what he always wanted to say. He acted the fool for so many years, mostly because he found his daughter's fiery personality and the antics of his staff so amusing. Now was not the time to do so. And being prim and proper would never have accomplished much for anyone, anyway. He knew that a long time ago. "Sometimes one has to be one doesn't like before one is what they'd like to be. If we weren't, we'd never have a concept of forgiveness. We would never have goals. We'd never make progress. We'd never be able to save ourselves. We'd never even be able to recognize what we want and don't want to be."

Yuffie turned back toward the window. Her brow was almost constantly furrowed now. "Mother always beat it into my head about being right, " Yuffie now halfway thought out loud to herself, and halfway spoke to her father. This was a conversation they both put off for a long time. Even to her, deep down, saving the Planet was a priority. Because her town, the _people_ in it, sat on it.. And her town..._mattered_. "And fair. And honest. Why did you not ever support her? Why would you want a thief for a daughter?"

"Yuffie, because I knew beforehand through the fortunetellers around here, that you would rescue this village through thievery and deception. And just think about it. You have. You've met the people who made that possible through it. Of course, I never imagined such a horrible thing could happen as the Meteor spell...but you did in fact rescue the town from destruction."

Yuffie realized that she did, in fact, meet Cloud's crew through thievery. If she hadn't been scoping out booty in the forests around Cosmo Canyon that day, she was sure she'd never have met up with them any other way. But still. Her desire to do something truly good was blinding her ability to accept her own past. And she realized how much she really couldn't have done anything differently, and bring security to her town sooner, and more honestly. "I didn't want to just rescue it. I wanted to make it better than it ever was. I wanted to make it better than before Grandfather ruled it."

"You will." Godo started a horrendous choking. Yuffie rushed over to him and grabbed him by the gi lapels. "Don't you dare, Father! Don't you dare leave me here with all this work undone!"

Still choking, Godo gently held Yuffie's tiny wrist with a weak hand. "Yuffie, your people love you now because of your work with those kids. Take advantage of it."

Tears welling up in her eyes, she continued to look down at her father and hope for the best.

"And...Yuffie?"

"Yeah?"

Yuffie could barely hear him. Godo smiled. "Don't...screw it up."

That was the first time Godo had said anything to scare her. No, the word "scare" wasn't right. Order? Expect? No. Maybe it was simply Godo revealing what he wanted, so obviously and unmistakeably. Until now Godo was a man happy to be in the background, and though had to accept a few things he didn't appreciate, did it all for everyone's welfare.

Yuffie smiled at him, ever so slightly, and Godo closed his eyes. With wet cheeks, Yuffie wanted to laugh, and she wanted to say more, and hear more, but it was too late.

"I won't screw it up, father. Now that I know who i am, I can be who I want to be. Wutai can be what it wants. The greatest. And proud."

Tifa was the first to fully awaken. She was surprised to find herself sleeping on Cloud's shoulder. How was it that she fell asleep? Oh, yeah. Side by side, just sitting down. So how did this happen? She could only guess it was because they missed being home.

The first thing Tifa noticed was tht the ship seemed utterly still. _Too_ still. It had definitely been predictably rocking side-to-side, but the feeling of going forward was noticeably missing. She pulled away from Cloud, as difficult as it was, and skooched over to the door to try and listen for anyone outside to get a clue of what's happening. She couldn't hear anyone, and while it was frustrating to not know what was going on, the positive side was maybe they could discuss how to get off the ship once it docked.

Cloud was snoring softly. Tifa poked him lightly in the ribs with an elbow, trying to get him up as quietly and quickly as possible. "Hey," she whispered closely to his head.

Not any good. Tifa had a cutely miffed experssion on her face. Once Cloud was out, he was usually _out_. Particularly after time of stress.

She tried poking him again, a little harder. Her whisper became a little more intense. "...HEY!..."

Cloud stirred a bit, but nonetheless remained out of commission.

Tifa rolled her eyes. She really hated waking Cloud up. Not because it was difficult to rouse him in times like this, but she'd just really rather let the boy sleep. But naptime was over, and they had to be ready for the unpridectable.

To wake him up, of course she had to get a little creative. She took hold of the lock of hair that bordered the side of his face...and started playing with it. _A nice braid should do it._

As soon as she started fiddling around, Cloud started weakly batting away at her hand. He could feel her gently pulling on the hair as she braided it. His eyes finally fully opened. He was hungry, and was starting to get a headache. "W...what are you doing?"

"Waking you up." She quickly undid the braid and returned the lock of hair to its natural state. Cloud couldn't stand his hair braided. It tended to unravel too easily, and in a matter of hours pop out all over the place, no matter how much he took care of it. His hair lent itself to more non-traditional styles like...well, spikes. "The ship's stopped. I wonder why."

"Ship..." Cloud parroted, half awake. The two of them suddenly noticed the ship's slight, rhythmed side-to-side rock was becoming more pronounced. It was becoming rather violent.

There was a pause again in the ship's motion, made all the more obvious by how much it was moving a second before. Again, it was way too still and quiet before a thunderous noise and a terrible tremor almost caused the both of them to roll on their sides. Cloud had to support himself with an arm, Tifa with both arms, to keep their sitting positions.

"Crap, we've hit something! Or something's hit us!" Cloud angrily said.

"We're gonna have to get out of this room! But we'll be discovered!"

Cloud tried to think of something useful to say. "We'll have to sit tight for now until we know how bad the damage to the ship is. Maybe we can ride this out." Tifa thought this was the best thing to do, considering the fact they were stowaways who shouldn't have been there in the first place. Maybe the ship was reinforced...or maybe the loud sound and shaking was cargo being slung back and forth within the ship.

Moments passed, and they finally heard a commotion in the hall. Sure enough, a few men who had been working deeper within the ship were running toward the deck. And Cloud and Tifa were noticing a sudden puddle forming as water dripped in in a steady stream in the opening at the bottom of the door. At this point, they could only guess how fast the water was rushing into the ship. They both realized they _needed_ to risk being discovered, and go up to the deck, or drown.


	26. Chapter 26

Chapter 26.

Barret and Vincent more or less impatiently waited for the Captain to arrive. Phil worked tirelessly trying to make some progress, but trying to fix the ship was like trying to pick up all the sand on a beach with a Dust Buster.

Time passed, and Phil became more and more hopeless to have to try and do this all by himself. He walked away from the airship, paced heavily toward the two other men, and dropped down to his hands and knees in utter frustration. "I'll never be able to do this!" he cried.

Barret and Vincent glanced at each other, underwhelmed.

A horrible sound was heard coming quickly toward them. A creature's roar? A dragon's cry? A giant shuriken heading right for them?

The huge, dark man got his Missing Score weapon at the ready. Vincent cooly raised the terrifying Death Penalty, aiming for any vital organ that happened to show up first.

They realized the horrible commotion sounded an awful lot like...squawking.

Over the horizon a figure approached. Barret's eyebrows went up in curiosity. Vincent's eyes narrowed in bafflement.

Cloud's golden chocobo, Sunrise, was running toward them. But her beak was shut. _She_ wasn't making the terrible ruckus they heard.

Cid was.

They watched him painfully bouncing up and down and all over on the bird's back, desperately holding onto the Venus Gospel in one hand and the bird's reigns in the other. they heard all sorts of words that melted their ears and Cid hollered and howled and complained about his transportation from the moment they spotted him on the horizon, to the moment Sunrise delivered the captain, stopping a few feet in front of them.

Cid tried to act as suavely as he could muster. His butt hurt. His legs hurt. Stuff just really, really HURT. He wanted to dismount gracefully, but as soon as his right leg touched the ground after swinging it around the bird's back, he crumpled on the ground, sat cross-legged, and held his forehead in a hand.

An inordinate pause loomed in the air.

"That...really...^$#%$^#%$^#...hurt."

Sunrise closed her eyes and haughtily threw her head to the side.

The three men allowed the Captain to recover for a moment. Cid slowly got back up on his feet, and lit a well-deserved ciggie. Ahhh, nicoteine. He looked up from lighting up, took in the even more painful sight of the grounded airship, and noticed the huge gash in the ground that led up to it.

Phil was the first to open his mouth. "Sir...Could you give your diagnosis? We were hoping you could tell how badly-"

"Piece a' crap," Cid roughly interjected as he blew out some bluish-grey smoke. He didn't even need to look at the inside. He could tell just from taking one quick glance that the ship was grounded for a while. It would take too many men and way too much time to raise it. "It's a piece of crap now." He turned his attention to the men. "Good thing I'm here through. Wouldn't be able to sleep knowing you're going to Wutai without some extra reinforcement."

Barret was constantly thinking of the next immediate step. "So...now what?"

Vincent suddenly had an idea as what to do in the situation of a totally grounded airship, as the issue was percolating in his mind the whole time. "Time for plan B."

_Hmmm?,_ thought all three men in response.

From beneath the cover of blackest hair, he sideglanced the rest of them. "You're not going to like it at all."

The other three men stared at him with bated breath.

Cloud and Tifa ran to the top deck. Sure enough, they got drenched in the pouring rain, the wind was howling, the sky was dark slate grey, and the sea deep and violent. It wasn't too long before they were naturally noticed by some of the men working on the ship, and both of them dispatched them all too easily.

The two of them scurried around trying to look for a raft or lifeboat or something., anything all along the port side to put themselves in and get away from the sinking ship and its crew.

Turning around to go to the other end of the deck, a stately, dark figure stood tall and strong in the center of the doomed ship. Some men must have cowered from them and reported to the captain. And the captain, indeed, was a very intimidating man.

"Stowaways!" boomed the captain. "Practically took a hurricane to bring the rats out of the lower levels...but nevertheless, my little friend and I are not getting off this ship until I know you're not taking any of my men's liferafts."

Cloud and Tifa were tired already from dealing with the captain's crew, inspite of the ease in dealing with them. If they had to hold on to a raft in a hurricane, they needed every ounce of strength they could spare to deal with the waters once they get on it.

Cloud happened to look left, and bared his teeth in terror. A Master Tonberry waddled, his yellow eyes matching the flame in his lamp, the lamp and eyes both glowing hotly in the greyness of the storm. "Holy crap, that's bad."

Tifa saw it too, and shuddered with good reason; in spite of their small, unassuming size and manner, the Master Tonberry was now the deadliest magician on the Planet. Being innately magical creatures, they retained almost all their power, even when the magic level on the Planet dropped considerably when all the materia shattered.

They could cast their Curse spell quickly and quietly using their magical lamps. And there were few, if any, cures left for their Curses once cast. They could dodge attacks rather well, especially since the huge, heavy Ultima weapon wasted precious time preparing and finishing attacks...another surprising talent looking at their short, stubby reptilian legs. Further complicating issues, the death of the creature didn't mean the end of the death spell it cast. And even against the Ultima weapon, an usually strong Master Tonberry had a vast, vast amount of resistance. A Tonberry could take hits until its body was cut off from the neck down. The quickest way to render it harmless would be to destroy its lamp, but the amazing strength and speed of the little unassuming creature made getting to that lamp difficult.

Cloud called out loudly, his voice straining to be heard above the roar of the wind and rain. "TIFA! Take the captain!" He tossed his head towards the Tonberry. "I'll deal with that!"

Tifa nodded in understanding. She turned toward the looming figure of the captain. Cloud came between her and the Tonberry, and drew the Ultima weapon. If Cloud was lucky, this could probably be a once-strike kill, or at least a succesful rush on the lamp, and he was sure he could do just that with his own weapon as opposed to Tifa fighting the reptile. If it wasn't a one-strike-success...well...he had to take that chance.

Cloud moved inbetween Tifa and the Tonberry, the point of the weapon trained first of all, on the lamp.

Barret was beyond agitated beyond belief at this point. He turned to Vincent, punctuating his verbiage with angry pauses. "This is the damned...most...EMBARRASING...thing...I have...EVER...done!"

Vincent, and in fact, all the men, were bouncing up and down from the waves.

"Whassa matter wit choo?"

Vincent closed his eyes and quietly answered. "Necessary evil."

"We're in the middle of the ocean...in a BIG WOODEN BOX...on SKIS...gettin' pulled by a GIANT BIRD!" Barret looked away in fury, then turned back, finger pointing in the air. "You betta not breathe a word of this to Marlene, man, or she won't EVER live this thang down!"

They did, in fact, construct a makeshift skiing boat out of wood salvaged from the crashed airship. It was, granted, the best thing to do, since Sunrise could literally run on the ocean water's surface. Leaving the rest of the crew to keep working to get the ship airborne, only the four men, Barret, Cid, Vincent and Phil, could take it from here. Cid was still hurting from riding on Sunrise to the rest of the men; nonetheless, he was happy to take his favorite student along; maybe Phil could learn something from the adventure. Cid had learned so many things since meeting Cloud, it was time for someone else to learn something. For a change. His cranky ass had enough education to last three lifetimes.

Sunrise, once she got going with the weight of the skiing boat, did nicely. She was slowed down considerably with the extra weight, which sort of worried Barret at first, but as long as she got taken care of royally when she got home, she'd be fine. And she knew she would. Especially by Cid.

Tifa stood with her arms on her hips, the Premium Heart set of gloves on her hands. The rain swept heavily across her face and matted down her long, deep brown hair.

She stared at the captain with searing reddish-brown eyes. She narrowed them. "I'm waiting for a stupid comment about my size. Or the fact I'm a girl. Or even about my boobs."

"I have many members on this ship who are half the size of you and are still terrible opponents."

She was sure he wasn't just talking about his men, but the Master Tonberry behind her, where Cloud was now moving.

The captain added, "Unfortunately, *I* am also a terrible opponent!"

"And so am I!" retorted Tifa.

And with that, they lunged at each other.

Tifa had a mighty right fist ready to strike. As she approached the opponent, she threw the fist forward aiming straight for the captain's nose.

The captain deftly dodged her fist, and grabbed her arm. He threw both Tifa's arm and the rest of her at the deck, but Tifa quickly recovered and rolled out of it. She turned herself toward her opponent in mid-air. hitting the deck, her momentum caused her boots to scrape on the wood beneath her, leaving skid marks leading up to the soles of her heavy boots. She came to a stop, and balanced herself with a fist. Her eyes glared. She was pissed. She wasn't used to anyone being quick enough to counter her fast right!

The captain took advantage of his opponent's situation, and headed right for her, planning to use an elbow as a cannon. Tifa rolled to her left, quick as lightning, and, landing on her hands and feet backwards, promptly introduced the captain's face to a steel-toed boot. The impact brought him to the ground, holding his face to ease the pain.

Tifa lunged at him again intending to end their match with another mighty straight. The captain caught her fist in mid-blow, but this time Tifa was more than ready. Using her momentum, she flipped herself clear over the captain, and, with her left hand grabbing the arm blocking her fist, brought the arm around and snapped it practically in two. The captain cried out.

Tifa sent a foot flyiung to do a roundhouse kick, but the captain, with everything he had left, caught Tifa's foot with his good hand, and using the sheer power of his frustration in almost losing and getting fueled from his throbbing arm, deftly threw her into the railing surrounding the deck of the ship. Using his full weight, he crashed into her as she was pinned against it.

Sensing an advantage, he grabbed her again by the hair, and threw her into the mast supporting the main sail. Tifa felt her head knocking against the mast, and struggled to keep her senses about her as she leaned heavily, struggling to get the wind back into her lungs.

The captian was ready to simply knock her out, and throw her overboard. He ran towards Tifa as she supported herself against the mast. As he approached, she could feel him getting closer...and closer. As he threw his final blow, Tifa was done playing 'possum, and making a quick complete turn, delivered that stright right she wanted to give him twice already.

She landed the blow right in his soft belly...and froze. There was an eternal pause as she gritted her teeth waiting to see the effects of her punch.

The captain let out a tiny "urk", fell over, and clutched his stomach, coughing.

Cloud paced around the creature with the massive Ultima weapon. As long as it wasn't going anywhere, he continued to press forward..inch by precious inch. He whispered a steady mantra as he got closer and closer. "Creepy lizard...don't even think about it...don't...even..."

The Master Tonberry was puzzlingly oblivious to his approach; its eyes were fixed on the captain of the ship and Tifa.

Slowly, the Tonberry raised a little green hand, and started to shake its lamp.

Cloud knew it was trying to cast a Curse spell.

He gripped the hilt of the Ultima weapon. He tensed his legs, and bolted forward as fast as he could. He'd smash that damned lamp to pieces in one blow.

The Tonberry amazingly sidestepped the move. It zipped to the left in a green blur, and apparently hardly moving its legs at all.

Cloud sneered. A miss that could have devastating consequences.

The creature was now tuning its head toward Cloud. Cloud found an eerie, unsettling feeling well up from inside as its gaze met his eyes. Perhaps this is why people rarely, if ever, tried to mess with a Tonberry.

The good news was that the spell the creature tried to cast was interrupted. That's all that mattered for now until Cloud could try another quick strike.

Unfortunately, the little demon scurried far away, towards the stern of the ship, far away from Tifa and her opponent at the front. Well out of range.

As Cloud inched his way again, the creature fixed its eyes forward once again. On Tifa, Cloud knew.

The Tonberry raised its lamp again...and began a new curse.

Cloud knew he had no time to lose now. He dropped out of offensive position and raced towards the Tonberry, the Ultima weapon held to the side and back, ready for a kill swipe.

Cloud knew he saw a dark cloud escape from the lamp. A spell was successfully cast.

The Tonberry dropped its lamp and gazed once again at Cloud, who was now racing toward him. The little monster was giving Cloud one more chance to give up and leave the ship, preferably he hard way. The Tonberry raised its lamp again.

It was casting another spell.

Now that the monster was in the middle of casting a curse, it was helpless. Cloud swung the Ultima weapon mightily and brought it down.

It hit the target perfectly.

The lamp was smashed to bits under the massive size and weight of the Ultima weapon. Gold pieces of glass scattered in every direction; the wood encasing it was shattered to splinters.

Its little reptilian hand was lopped off right with it. But it was all too late.

The Ultima weapon smashed the floorboard to pieces where it dug in, still needing to dispel force from loud's blow.

The Tonberry, stunned, turned its eerie gaze toward Cloud again. It was helpless now that its main weapon was destroyed. Cloud saw the demon which had escaped from the lamp fly forward towards the bow of the ship. He knew what was going to happen.

It stared at Cloud as he hissed softly. "You...little...damn you..."

Powered by sheer fury, Cloud lifted the weapon out of the floorboards it was jammed into. He swung it around 360 and brought it down and around to his front again.

He ended up lopping the entire little evil creature right in half.

The cleaved halves of the Tonberry went their separate ways; the legs dropped to the ground; the upper half was removed with such force that it flew across the deck into the railing that surrounded the deck of the ship. It left a bloody mess as it flopped down to the floorboards.

After recovering from his sheer rage, Cloud got his head together. He returned the blade to its harness on his back and ran as fast as he could toward the bow.

As he reached the bow, he saw Tifa with her hands on her knees, and the whimpering ship's captain at her feet. The black cloud of the curse advanced toward her steadily.

Cloud tried to catch up to it, but couldn't. He wondered if he called her attention to it, if she could dodge it. He felt unbearably guilty; the first curse was for Tifa, as the Tonberry was bound to protect the ship's captain before it protected itself; the second was for Cloud himself, which he stopped by destroying the lamp in time. He was angry tht the first spell wasn't meant for himself.

"TIFA!...TIFA!" CLoud desperately screamed from the rear of the ship as he ran.

Tifa only had time to look up.

The spell surrounded her...and entered through her chest...where her heart beat.

The Curse spell had been successfully cast.

Cloud immediate had the vision that usually accompanies a Curse spell...a skull, superimposed upn TIfa, looked down on her and opened its horrible jaw. Its eyes glowed eerie yellow, like the Tonberry's eyes. Her skin immediately turned about ten shades whiter...and while she rarely dropped tot he ground from fistfights with opponents, the powerful death spell brought her to her knees.

Time was now of the essence. If a cure was not found for her, she would die in a matter of a few hours.


	27. Chapter 27

Chapter 27.

Cloud woke up with a start. He hacked up a bit of water, before discovering he was on a beach. In the distance, a forest behind which peeked Bone Village, and beyond that, layers of excavated levels, and on each level were achaeologists hard at work toting equipment, digging in the dirt, and pushing full wheelbarrels. _At least I know where I am_, he thought to himself.

Then he remembered how he got here. Tifa...the spell...the hurricane...the ship sinking...the mast falling down and knocking the both of them in the water...Cloud calling tirelessly for Tifa and getting no answer...

Tifa. Where was Tifa! He whipped his head left and right and could only see sand. He immediately got to his feet and ran along the shore, screaming for her.

Reaching an outcrop of rock, he figured it would get him a better vantage point, so he climbed up onto it. After a few fruitless times of calling for her again, he climbed back down to the and on the other side of the rock formation.

There she was.

She was face down, her long hair out of its usual low ponytail. Dark rivers of hair covered the sand next to her.

He flipped her onto her back, and checked for breathing. Yeah, she was alive. She just seemed to be sleeping. Cloud breathed a sigh of relief.

But it wasn't long-lived; he remembered the curse cast on her by the Master Tonberry right before they got smacked with the mast. _Gotta get her to that village and ask them for something to cure her,_ he thought quickly.

He lightly patted her cheek. "Tifa! TIFA! C'mon, get up, we have to get you moving...Tifa!"

She half groaned and half snorted. She opened up her ruby eyes, stretched a lot, and sat up. "Hey, relax. I'm fine."

A horrifying skull was superimposed upon her lovely face. "Yeah, just fine." Cloud sarcastically agreed. "We need to get to that village and find a way to remove that curse spell."

"Yeah..." Tifa got up with Cloud's help, but almost comically ended up hopping around on one foot. "Ow, ow ow! Not fine! Not fine! Toe broken!" Tifa held her foot with the sore toe off the ground, and looked at him in mock fury. This made Cloud snicker in spite of the fact her time was running out from the spell cast on her. Cloud offered to carry her but she refused. She walked on worse than a broken toe before.

Steadily they made their way towards the village. Cloud didn't want to rush Tifa with her broken toe, but nonetheless he *was* pushing her a bit so they could find out if they had any magic or equipment left to remove the Curse spell. A perfect stranger probably wouldn't be able to tell, but Cloud could certainly tell she was getting steadily weaker as the spell advanced more and more. At first she hobbled along completely under her own power; eventually she had to resort to being held up occasionally. She was getting dizzy.

As the couple drew closer to the village, Cloud ran ahead and entered various stores to ask if they had any Curse-removing implements. While in the stores, he passed out many shelves featuring authentic Bone Village souvenirs (that nobody actually had to *dig* for) marked "Made in Wutai". He probably would have thought that pretty strange if he actually had time to contemplate it...but now was not the time.

He asked almost everyone in the Bone Village market square if anyone had anything to remove a Tonberry curse. The general concensus was that since the people in Bone Village were pretty much too terrified, or maybe too smart, to lock horns with a Tonberry, the entire place was hopelessly devoid of anything that might remove their deadly curse.

Tifa was getting markedly worse. She had to be supported almost constantly now.

Cloud's next move was to go to the foreman at the excavation site. They worked with this man many times, and gave up a lot of Gil to him so his staff could dig for rare items. He asked the foreman if he had a remote paging device. The foreman did, so Cloud set it to Cid's frequency and hit the "send" button.

The four fine gentlemen made their way across the ocean, the skis on the bottom of their makeshift craft gliding over the waves, hitting watery bumps almost rhythmically as the golden chocobo ran across the surface of the water. Barret thought he was getting seasick. Cid's rear end was still hurting a bit from crossing the ocean on the bird's back the first time. Vincent calmly processed strategies as to how to get through the hoardes of warriors they no doubt were going up against when they'd get to Wutai.

Practically the only one truly enjoying the trip was Phil. He stuck an arm outside the box to feel the water splashing against it. He shaded his eyes from the sun, with a big, wide smile across his face. The wind whipped his nondescript brown hair around, and when he wasn't shading his eyes, he was running his fingers through his hair, helping the wind fluff it. He strangely reminded Vincent of a dog happily hanging it's head out a car window. And for one of the few times in Vincent's undead...um...life, he managed to smile.

As they drew closer and closer to shore, they saw exactly what they expected. A swarming, black mass of Wutai soldiers, Yuffie Kisaragi at the lead, her arms crossed defiantly as she raised an eyebrow, puzzled at the unceremonious way that her former comrades arrived. She and her magicians knew the guys could be here at any moment to get Cloud and Tifa back, and predictably, here they were. She was ready for them.

The chocobo was clearly getting tired and was more than satisfied to see the shore approaching. She dashed up the beach for a little, and slowed down with the momentum of the earthbound ski-box.

The stupid-looking box came to a halt. To add insult to injury, one of the skids broke in half under the combined weight of all four men. The box crashed down on one side and threw the men head over heels, and over each other.

A long pause. Yuffie didn't know whether to laugh or...laugh harder.

Phil, tangled in the mess, raised a hand, pointed at the girl and her troops. "Uh...ATTACK!"

Cid promptly slapped him lightly up the back of the head.

Yuffie recovered from her utter embarassment at the method of their arrival. She knew the combined power of all of them could defeat her whole army (not that SHE couldn't do that herself, mind you) and THIS is how they show up. She looked down at the men, trying to unknot themselves and standing up one by one. "I know what you're here for."

Cid did the talking when all four were on their feet. He puffed on a ciggie he just lit up. "Yeah. So hand 'em over, ya brat."

Yuffie, much smaller than the Captain, uncrossed her arms. She snaked one arm behind her back, and got a hold of her giant shuriken. She brought it in front of her slowly. With her arms outstretched, she paused, staring Cid straight in the eyes. Vincent noticed something undefinably different in her gaze this time.

She dropped the shuriken on the ground.

Even her own troops were shocked.

"They're not here." Vincent picked up that she sounded sad...very, very sad. He instantly believed her, but didn't want to say it out loud too soon.

"And we're supposed totake YO' word on that, ya little freak!" Barret was indignant.

In answer, Yuffie turned to all the soldiers behind her. "DROP EVERYTHING, NOW!"

The soldiers behind her didn't understand, but they listened anyway. A loud thumping noise was heard as the soldiers dropped everything from shurikens to explosives to firearms to katanas.

Yuffie turned backward, and scanned the troops behind her. Her eyes fell upon one particularily guilty-looking grunt, and she stared him down. He balked, reached in his pocket, and dropped a flimsy set of brass knuckles.

Yuffie turned back toward the foursome. "I SAID...they're NOT HERE. Do you want to WASTE your time looking in my prison for them?"

Vincent was touched, and impressed. But he still remained silent.

"Ya only brought about five hundred men with ya. Shows that ya still want to wrestle."

Yuffie recrossed her arms. "I didn't ask any of these people to come along. They just ended up following me when word leaked out you guys were going to be here."

Silence filled the beach. Yuffie was the first to speak. She did so in a quiet enough voice so only the men could hear. "Look...I've...been thinking...the nine of us...did something really amazing..."

Vincent knew it was the right time to start working with Yuffie instead of against her. "Say no more. Start to redeem yourself by having your troops search for tips on where Cloud and Tifa might be."

Yuffie looked like she truly appreciated Vincent's forgiveness. Without missing a beat she turned backwards again and barked orders. "Pick up your stuff and question everyone at the dock about where the brown-haired girl and the guy with the weird eyes went. Get back to me."

The numbers of troops remaining on the beach slowly dwindled down. Refusing to pick up her shuriken for the moment, Yuffie stared down at her hands and rubbed them together. Her hands were dry. As she played with the cuticles aroudn her fingernails in utter silence, the chocobo, Sunrise, took it upon herself to walk up to her, and nuzzle her face. Since she was massively larger than Yuffie, she squatted down on her powerful legs to help bring herself down to Yuffie's height. Yuffie looked into her big, beautiful blue eyes. "Is it possible to start all over?"

The bird cooed in approval.

Yuffie, Sunrise, Barret, Phil and Vincent set off walking towards the town. Cid stayed behind and for the life of him couldn't contemplate why in the world Sunrise would take such a liking to Yuffie.

He removed the ciggie he was smoking from his mouth and spread his arms, palms up in desperation as the others walked out of earshot. "What the %#^ am I...chopped liver!"

Minimal time passed when Yuffie received a report from one of her investigators about the couple's possible whereabouts. The informant told her that an old fisherman on the pier saw two people fitting Cloud's and Tifa's descriptions stowing away on a souvenir cargo ship headed for Bone Village. The rain was coming down in an ever-so-slight drizzle, and the old fisherman warned them they might have to scrape their friends off some deserted island due to the nasty weather he knew they'd encounter.

Cid immediately arranged for a quick clipper to be sent off from the dock. They had a long way to go, and a lot of inlets to navigate before they got to Bone Village. It would be a while, but the fast clipper should get them all there quickly, and certainly much more comfortably than the wooden box they used to get to Wutai.

It seemed an eternity riding the waves to Bone Village. Yuffie decided to go with them, after all, it was only her fault that the whole mess happened. She knew she was utterly responsible if anything happened to them, and after losing her father, wouldn't have wanted anyone else to lose someone they loved.

Vincent cooly drew up behind her as he walked by. He leaned over to his left, where Yuffie was peering over the railing of the clipper. She was just tall enough to support herself with a forearm and an elbow. She held up her head in a cupped hand and looked lost in thought. Vincent calmly said, "You let them go. Didn't you?"

Yuffie turned around and looked up at the tall man in the crisp navy blue suit. "Yeah. Sometimes things happen...and you realize...that you can't have any pride in yourself when you work against people who are constantly doing good. What we did for this Planet is good. It makes no sense to screw it all up by continuing to fight for stupid reasons. It's time to fix problems...not be a dumbass and cause more."

Vincent gave an understanding grunt, and let himself lean on the railing aside of Yuffie.

Cid came running up to the two of them, waving an activated PHS in his hands. Phil followed, with Barret leading Sunrise close behind. "The kids called!" He was practically out of breath running across the deck to Yuffie and Vincent. He figured he had one too many ciggies in worriment that day. "They're in Bone Village. Dipshit's OK, but Tifa is in serious trouble." He spoke into the PHS. "Wassa matter with ya?"

Cloud's voice came through the tiny device. "She's been hit with a Curse spell from a Master Tonberry."

Everyone gasped in unison.

"Do you have anything stashed anywhere that can fix it?"

Cid scratched his head as he mentally went through the inventory of the crashed airship. "Ya think a Holy Torch might do it? It casts DeSpell, it might remove the curse. We usually used it on monsters and crap, but it might work."

"Sounds good."

"Problem is, the airship is south of Wutai and there's no quick or easy way to get there. Hold it, we'll thinka somethin'." He flipped off the communicator and looked at each of his buddies in turn. "So. Anbody got a crazy idea?"

On the other end of the line, Cloud paced and brushed back his hair nervously.

Yuffie thought for a moment, then spoke up. "I'll do it. I'll take the chocobo and get it for you."

Vincent thought it was a great idea. "Nothing's faster than a Ninja on a thoroughbred, after all."

Barret huffed. "Nice to offer ya kindness after, yanno, tryin' ta get 'em killed an all. Prolly gonna steal Cloud's pet and sell 'er at auction for every Gil you can get."

Cid turned around and pointed two fingers, between which was a lit cigarette, at the big guy. "Shaddap. Not now. You still don't get what just happened in Wutai. Let it go, fer God's sake."

Barret looked down at the deck like a scolded child. Cid was right.

Sunrise walked over to Yuffie and looked at her with her big blue eyes. Yuffie stroked the bird's bill, and the bird nuzzled her again. She looked at the beautiful bird, then at the guys. "Give us just a half an hour."

Vincent wisely added, "Best to search in a place where we know where one is, rather than wasting time looking everywhere else and turning up nothing."

Cid relayed the plan to Cloud. Cloud suspected something was different about Yuffie. He knew that when she wasn't screaming after them when they broke out, trying to keep him imprisoned so she could get him to use his mighty summon materia. Yuffie blushed...just a little. But he could be filled in later. He unhesitatingly gave Yuffie his blessing. Both Cid and CLoud switched off their channels.

Yuffie lighted easily on the chocobo. Cid took another puff. He swiped at the air with the hand holding the cigatette when he finished taking a drag, and gave Yuffie and Sunrise a friendly, hopeful, enthusiastic pep talk. "The two a yas...get the hell lost."

And with that short but sweet encouragement, Sunrise, with the ultra-light, also ultra-fast Yuffie on her back, jumped right off the boat and screamed toward the west again, almost parting the water as she ran across its surface.


	28. Chapter 28

Chapter 28.

Cloud clicked off the "send" button on the PHS. The whole time while talking with Cid, Cloud sat at the table in the corner, along with the steadily weakening Tifa. She sat aside him now, resting too quietly on his shoulder, her eyes closed, her brow furrowed.

The digging company building was the first structure one would pass out on the way through the village, past the busy excavators. It was rather empty this time of day, especially for such a prominent place.

Cloud nudged Tifa lightly with a shoulder. She had to work at simply stay awake now. Cloud figured that as long as she was awake, she as alive.

"Hey."

Tifa mmmed a bit, and moved her head back and forth on Cloud's arm. He could feel her hair brushing against his skin. "Stupid...toe...," she whispered.

Cloud grinned again. Tifa was as tough as nails. Especially during a crisis such as being cursed with a death spell for which they had no immediate fix.

It was one of the things...he really loved about her.

Cloud wasn't sure how much information she could take in right now, but he nevertheless spoke to her, hoping it would keep her conscious. "Yuffie's on her way. With a Holy Torch."

Tifa's brow knitted deeply. "...brat..." she whispered.

Cloud laughed, and was ready to voice his agreement, but Tifa cut him off. "She's...a pretty cool kid. Sometimes...reminds me of...me," she said, her frown disappearing and a grin growing slowly as she was speaking.

Cloud smiled. However, he was curious as to what caused the change in Yuffie. Yuffie had always been a powerful ally in defeating Sephiroth, but she had always remained untrustworthy. The attempts on Cloud's and Tifa's lives had proved that, but considering the vast amount of help Yuffie provided the team, and now, her sudden, almost miraculous change of heart in coming to their aid, for Tifa's sake he was ready to let the past sit on the backburner for now.

Tifa suddenly groaned painfully. She leaned her full weight against Cloud's shoulder. It caused Cloud to get frantic for a moment or two, after which he picked her up and carried her over to the main desk. He asked for a room, and once he gave his name, the man at the desk had no problem with providing Cloud, the new mayor of Midgar, somewhere comfortable to put Tifa.

Cloud carried her up the steps. He sweated, terrified. He knew this was life or death. Tifa rarely had to be carried anywhere, and during their recent travels, would playfully punch him lightly in the face if he even offered and she was conscious enough to emphatically state that she didn't like the idea. In fact, she was the one that was usually there for him through all his own handicaps and trials.

How ironic that he had to help her through her own situation now. He was horrified at the notion that this opportunity could give him that chance to repay her for her favors. He'd rather be stuck in deep debt than this.

Sunrise flew across the ocean, not at her top speed, but still amazingly quickly in spite of how tired she was, but what really helped was her extremely light burden. Her brief stay on the clipper did give her a bit of rest, but she was aching for a good beakful of fresh greens. The best thing going for her now was that she had a light, cooperative, almost seemingly experienced passenger. Yuffie had no trouble acting as jockey. Oh, if only Sunrise could speak and tell her all about the horrible one with the big stick she had to take across the ocean to the ship earlier before! Well, anyway, she got what she wanted off _that_ one. She never liked him, but their little deal struck before she carried him to the wrecked airship made up for that.

In no time flat, the bird reached the shore where Wutai could be seen in the short distance. She went effortlessly from running across water to running onto land. Yuffie was impressed every time she rode Sunrise that there was never any change when she traveled from land to water, and back and forth. They all were the same to the amazing bird. _Cloud did something right for a change by having this bird hatched,_ thought Yuffie sarcastically.

Eventually, learning from directions given by Cid via PHS, they verified the position of the airship using the huge scar leading up to it. Before Yuffie dismounted from Sunrise, she took a moment to look at the aircraft. To really _look_ at it. She caused it. She caused everything. Well, now, for her father, she thought, she will help fix it.

She easily found an area that gave her direct access to the remnants of cargo Cid mentioned was still on board. It was a large, squarish area of completely missing wood. Yuffie rolled her eyes. No doubt that this was the place that the _awesome_ foursome got the wood to build that _stupid_-looking box they arrived in. The condition of the ship told her why they had arrived in a stupid-looking box at all.

Yuffie climbed inside. Due to the curvature of the craft, she had to roll a bit, then get up on her feet, and dust herself off.

She was horrified.

There must have been a hundred boxes in the cargo hold!

The PHS rang. She picked it up and clicked it on. Holding one hand on her hip, disgusted, she heard Cid on the other end.

"Whaddaya doin'?" he asked, genuinely concerned.

"Flipping out because I'm staring at an entire warehouse of identical boxes in here!"

Cid made a "nice-nice" gesture to the PHS to try and lessen Yuffie's anger. Not that she'd be able to see it or anything.

Everyone else humphed. They figured that was usually Cloud's job. When Tifa PHSed him.

The Captain continued. "Eh...sheesh...it's OK...I got it all under control. The right box is..." Scratching his head, he pulled out long-buried information. "It's a smaller box. Hmmm... The box has some kinda stupid writing on it. I think it's plastic and has a red lid. Like one of those Rubberconstructed-brand-storagethingamajiggers. It's fulla stuff I was cleaning out of one of my old rooms when we were together, and I had to make room for you newbies."

"Ok." Yuffie said, a little less exasperatedly, while she rooted around for the "Rubberconstructed, red-topped, storage-type thingy. With stupid writing on it," as she repeated to herself.

She had to go through almost the entire cargo hold, picking up heavy boxes, and slinging them aside. Anyone else of lesser strength couldn't have searched as long as Yuffie did. Yuffie wasn't only clever and fast, but her strength was often underestimated. Howver, Yuffie knew she'd be pretty damn sore in a few days as continuing to sling around the heavy wooden crates was starting to get tiring.

After a few minutes of searching, she finally did literally stumble over a box similar to that described by the Captain. Yuffie picked up the plastic, opaque box and examined it. "Wash-room 87" said the writing, done in thick black marker. Yuffie could see a bunch of old rags through the plastic.

She opened the lid.

And once the lid was off, she almost passed out from the stench.

Holding her nose and trying not to barf, she furiously unhitched her shuriken and used it to poke through the awful rags in the box. _I've dealt with a lot of disgusting things in my life, but I ain't touching this crap!_ she thought. She picked up a rag with the point of her shuriken, and examined it, holding it away from her as far as she could.

She just wanted to die. _This...this is all dirty underwear!_ she thought, turning greener and greener by the second.

Yuffie threw the underwear as far away as she could from her as she continued to search for the Holy Torch. _For cryin' out loud, Cid...you owe me big time for this!_ she thought.

Finally, she saw a black, thinly conical stick at the bottom of the box. She had found the Holy Torch! However, she had to hold it as far away from her after grabbing it out of the box. The torch smelled as rotten as the rest of the stuff she had to deal with. "Ugh!" she said to herself, "It's called a freaking _Holy_ Torch! Things that are _holy_ are supposed to smell _good_!"

Climbing her way out of the cargo hold, she emerged from the battered airship, to Sunrise's delight. She heard the PHS ring again, and answered it, knowing who it was. _"Do you know how **gross** that was, you freaking caveman!_" she yelled into it.

Cid went silent for a second, which was on the whole completely unusual for him. "So...uh...ya got the Torch?" he said delicately, trying desperately to ignore the confused looks from the other men around him.

Yuffie sighed. "Yeah. Got it."

Cid's outlook brightened, which was obvious even over the PHS. "Well, great! Get the hell over to Bone Village, pronto!" he ordered enthusiastically.

Yuffie closed contact with Cid. "Yeah, yeah," she moaned. She walked over to Sunrise, who balked at the terrible odor of the magical instrument in Yuffie's hand.

Yuffie noticed Sunrise's disgust. "Sorry. Maybe it'll air out," she said to the bird apologetically. She climbed aboard the chocobo and pointed her toward Bone Village. Sunrise took off at a blazingly fast gallop.


	29. Chapter 29

Chapter 29.

Sunrise hit the shore near Bone Village a little less than gracefully, as by this time, she was more than completely worn out. Crossing entire continents and oceans multiple times in a single day was a ton of running around, and even made the hardy golden chocobo exhausted.

Sunrise fell to her knees in the grass soon after landing, panting heavily. Her eyes were crossed, and her head made little circles for a moment from dizziness. Once she was resting on the ground, it took her a moment to shake the dizziness out of her head, and the little gold chocobos running in a circle around her head disappeared.

Yuffie dismounted, and made sure the chocobo would be OK. After confirming that Sunrise just needed some rest, she gave the bird a soft pat on the head, now that she could reach it. "Thanks, cutie!" said the ninja girl, and the chocobo cooed warmly in response. "I usually get motion sickness something awful, but with you, I didn't feel a thing!" The girl ran towards the inn, waving a last "see ya!" at the bird, who fluffed her wings, and waited for the rest of her humans to arrive.

Yuffie sprinted quickly for the inn where Cloud and Tifa were housed.

Her eyes began to water thinking about facing Cloud and Tifa after what she had done. She began to sniff, and wiped her nose with a forearm, trying not to give in to the urge to tear up and break down. She could not _allow_ herself to break down; she had to bring some honor to her father, her town, and herself, by fixing what she had sought to destroy.

Making her way towards the village, an awful smell caught her nose. She took a quick look at the Holy Torch she carried, and quickly came to the conclusion that the smell did not originate from that. It smelled kinda like..._Cid_...rather than pickled underwear...

Looking over to her right, she noticed a large figure looming over the horizon, with dark ribbon-like structures flowing out from it. The whole mass seemed to be moving around from its own power, and a toxic-looking dense cloud shrouded it.

When it turned toward her, she realized she was spotted by a Malboro.

_Crap!_ thought Yuffie. _ Well, I have no time to fight with you now!_

It slid toward her, hoping to catch her in its tentacles and blast her into submission with its horrid, negative-status-causing breath. Yuffie knew the thing was even more dangerous than ever, since no one carried materia or items to remove the bad statuses it could cause.

However, Yuffie's sheer speed was no match for the monster, and she flew by it before it could even catch her with a tentacle. She saw more monsters in the area, but was well on her way to the safety of the village before they even caught sight of her.

"Ok...so I was incredibly stupid...," she panted while running toward the inn at top speed. "So I tried to threaten two of the people who, in fact, helped save my hometown from getting whacked with a big ball of magical ego trip. So I tried to pit the dumb blonde against my town's guardian. I was stupid, and giving them this freakin' stinky torch'll hopefully not be so pissed off." Reaching the town, she looked up to the left, and began climbing the hill to the inn, ignoring the strange looks at her anxious hurry and the angry hollers she ilicited from running headlong into the passing excavators and townsfolk. "Not that they shouldn't be pissed off at me! But...still..."

She reached the door of the inn, and had to pause for a moment, not in sorrow, or regret...but in anger. "If I only woulda known there'd end up being no materia in the world..._I probably wouldn't have done anything that I ever felt I had to do!_"

Yuffie burst through the door, not quite knocking over yet another man, but certainly causing him to lose his grip on the many large scrolls of papers in his hands. "HEY!" he yelled at her angrily, shaking a fist as he watched her disappear into the inn. His precisely ordered drawings of artifacts and their locations littered the ground, and would take quite a while to reorder.

The ninja girl reached the front desk, and she slammed her open hand down on the dark wood. "_Strife_!" was the only word she shouted at the innkeeper.

She vaguely heard something about room 12.

All the innkeeper knew was that he felt a rush of air, and the short girl was gone.

Yuffie ran up the steps, looking at each numbered door for only an instant. She made it down the short hallway, and found the door marked "12". She used her fist to bang on the door a few times, and moments later, she heard the door unlock.

Cloud poked his head through the opening in the door, and did something Yuffie had rarely seen him do. Or, at least she had never seen him do it very well..._glare._

And Yuffie noted that this time, his glare was menacing. It was full of rancor and disgust, and, she could tell, _sheer hate._

Cloud held out an outstretched hand to her. "_Hand _it over." It was said with the most frigid coldness the ninja girl had ever heard Cloud muster. It was frightening.

Yuffie could only stare up inot his face, examining his cold glowing blue eyes for some hint of forgiveness, but finding none. She stumbled around for words for a moment, but, faced with the depths of Cloud's well-earned resent of her, she found herself rendered spechless, for the first time in her life. "Ah...uh..."

"_HAND IT OVER_!" His jaw was set, his teeth bared, and his glowing blue eyes flashed.

Yuffie took the Holy Torch, and was about to place it in his palm. It was meant to be a soft gesture, one that revealed her honest attempt to redeem herself. Cloud grabbed it from her hand, and disappeared into the room behind the door, still bearing that hateful, but well-earned scowl.

_WHAM!_

Cloud slammed the door practically on the girl's nose, the sheer force of his rage rattling the threshold, and causing the simple chandelier in the hallway to sway.

Yuffie lowered her head, and closed her eyes.

Barett, Phil, Vincent, and last but greatest, Cid Highwind, jumped off the clipper into the sandy water by Bone Village. They made a break for the shore, each bearing their own signature weapon, as they knew they would probably end up needing them before they got to the village proper. The calm-looking beach was looking a little too peaceful, and just because most magical items and materia had been shattered, didn't mean that magical monsters didn't exist anymore.

They pressed forward in hurried, disorganized formation, however, their faces clearly showed they meant business as they walked up from the sandy beach, to the grassy area right before the village.

Barett looked to his left, and there he spied the reflected sunlight glancing off Cloud's golden chocobo. She was seated on the ground, and casually picking at the ground for grass and seeds.

Barret waved his intact hand at the bird. "Hey!" he called out to his friends. Looking back at the others with him, the big guy called their attention to the chocobo, and they ran over to her.

Sunrise rose up from the ground, happy to see her humans. The four of them stopped around her momentarily, and she fluffed her feathers before fatigue forced her to return to sitting on the ground.

"Don't strain yourself," quietly advised Vincent. "You've done more than enough today." Sunrise warbled happily at the advice.

The men were about to continue on their way, when Sunrise gave a loud squawk that made them turn back at her.

The bird's pretty blue eyes were nailed menacingly on the man bearing the Venus Gospel.

Cid caught a glimpse of the bird's intent stare, and was the first to resume heading quickly toward the village. "Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know," he said, waving a gloved hand dismissively. _ Why does that fricking annoying ninja girl get a free ride when I have to wheel and deal! _thought Cid.

"What does that bird want with _you_, Captain?" asked Phil tentatively.

Cid waved the hand holding his cigarette at his pupil again, dismissing his question, and the chocobo went back to pecking at the ground.

They hurried along, and were soon on the grassy plain right before the village. Their wariness paid off, because no further did they go when a disgusting smell hit their noses.

"A Malboro is near," warned Vincent.

Picking up their pace, the four of them could see Bone Village in the distance, when Barett flying up into the air with a cry made the rest of them spin around.

Barett returned to the ground with a hard _thump_, and the four men could see the shallow gouge in the ground from the Flare spell with which he was hit. They traced the gouge back, and saw that a King Behemoth was gaining on them quickly...along with an array of demonic cohorts.

"_Shit_!" yelled Cid, twirling his partisan around. Cid looked over to Barett, who had gotten back up on his feet with a couple colorful words of his own. Cid could see that Barett's clothes were definitely not smoking as much as his temper, so he seemed to be alright otherwise. The Flare spell the monster used wasn't very strong or reliable, and the three men built up quite a tolerance to such attacks on their travels.

However, the combination of enemies attacking together was now outright dangerous.

"They must be getting desperate and cooperating with each other, due to the lack of healing items they're finding. We must eliminate them now, or they'll insist on following us into the village," noted Vincent, unholstering the Cerberus.

"Sonofa_bitch,_" cursed Cid one last time, for good measure. "We gotta split up here. "I'll take the King Behemoth. Vincent, you handle the Death Dealers. Barett, blow away that stinkin' Malboro before it gets to ya."

Each nodded, except Barett, who raised his gun arm, yelling "You got it!" loudly. They each ran in the direction of their appropriate opponent.

Cid looked over at his pupil, who was the last one left to be told what to do. Phil fisted his hands, eagerly waiting for his orders. "Phil. You..." at a loss for words, Cid took a last drag of his ciggie, then pointed a finger at Phil. "You distract those two bandersnatches over there until we clear up our own damned messes."

_Distract? _ Phil's face fell. "Gee..._thanks _for the vote of confidence, Captain," said Phil to himself disappointedly as Cid ran toward the monstrous King Behemoth.


	30. Chapter 30

Authoress' note: The Death Dealer's attacks are a little unconventional here, but o well. :)

Cid: Holy crap, this fight scene's one goddamn logistical pain in the ass!

Chapter 30.

Cid heard Phil mumble something, but easily ignored it as he fixed his attention on his most pressing problem- the quickly advancing King Behemoth right in front of him.

Cid squashed the stub of his cigarette on the flat side of a needle-sharp prong on his weapon, then tucked it under his goggles as he ran a short distance toward the monster. Stopping with a slide, he gripped the Venus Gospel more securely as he watched the monster lumber forward, its horns lowered and ready to strike.

"C'mon, you bastard..."

The monster was just about to strike, when the pilot made a huge leap into the air. The monster simultaneously reached the spot where Cid had been, and reared up its huge horns into the air in an effort to run him through, then throw him all the way to Rocket Town.

However, defying gravity, Cid easily leaped over the upward-pointing horns, and landed on the monster's thick neck. Driving the Venus Gospel repeatedly into the thick muscle, the pilot succeeded in not only wounding the monster badly, but also irritating it to no end.

The King Behemoth bucked viciously, and Cid was thrown off balance. He was flung into the air, but quite used to such heights, flipped himself around. He landed on the grass in a semi-kneeling position, his feet hitting the ground softly, like a cat's padded feet, despite his heavily muscled weight.

Cid reached up to adjust his goggles, when he realized his ciggie stub had gone MIA. Getting up and spinning around on his heel, Cid angrily drove the blunt end of his elaborate partisan into the ground, and defiantly placed a hand on a hip. "You #^$%!#!" he shouted at the thing, taking the Venus Gospel out of the ground and brandishing it. "You made me lose that damned ciggie stub! Now I'm_ really_ pissed!"

A faint wind blew Vincent's ebony black hair, tousling it lightly. A lock of hair threatened to get in he way of his steely focused eyes, but he ignored it.

He had his Cerberus drawn by his side, and it grazed the side of his sleek navy-blue slacks. Inside his black leather half-gloves, his trigger finger itched to take out at once both of the Death Dealers with which he was presently facing off.

The Death Dealers, however, did not seem to be stupid at all. They gave the marksman quite an impressive staredown from across the grassy field, not drawing any cards in lieu of seeing what their opponent did first. They shuffled their decks of cards single-handedly, their free hands behind their backs, flaunting their talent at manipulating their cards.

Vincent peered at them. They were moving away from each other. They had something planned.

Well, too bad. So did he.

Barret got his assignment from the Captain, and immediately the dark man turned away. He boldly ran right toward the slimy, foul-smelling Malboro, his gunarm blazing, and also cursing..._almost_ as badly as his team leader.

"Take that, ya stinkin' freaky snotball!" yelled the big guy at the monster. The Malboro retaliated to the annoying pricks of ammo by shooting out icy freeze beams. Barret had to do a bit of clumsy dodging and rolling while looking for openings to fire back; his feet made the now magically icy ground underneath his heavy boots crackle, and his arms were getting chilled whenever they made contact with the frosty ground.

_ I gotta take this thing out...before it casts 'Bad Breath'!_

Phil turned away from the Captain. He no sooner looked in front of him, when the two vicious, wolf-like Bandersnatches were running toward him, drool coming out of their opened, very toothy, hungry-looking mouths.

Phil turned round to his captain for a moment, eager to ask him what the hell he should do, since he had no weapons or magical powers with which to aid him. However, his teacher was already leaping high into the air, and probably out of the range of clear hearing should Phil say anything to him anyway.

Knowing that the bandersnatches were quickly advancing, Phil turned toward them again. He froze solid for a moment, the desperate need to come up with a plan on what to do blazing through his head.

He made an executive decision. Then he implemented his almost-but-not-quite-idiotproof plan:

He ran like hell!

...a flash of movement that less observant eyes wouldn't have caught...

Instantly, Vincent fired a shot at the Death Dealer. The Dealer had taken it upon itself to draw first.

The Cerberus still smoking, Vincent smirked. He knew he had aimed for the area right between the eyes.

When the smoke cleared, Vincent raised an eyebrow, puzzled that the dealer was still alive. Vincent squinted, and he could see that the Dealer had drawn the Ace of Pentacles, and the rather effective illusion produced from the shield-like coin pictured on the card had provided protection against the marksman's bullets.

The Dealer drew again, and both opponents began to move, circling each other gracefully and in total silence. Vincent was about to shoot again, when the Dealer had drawn its Hidden Sun card, and immediately Vincent was bathed in eye-piercingly painful light. He had expected a purely offensive card as a follow-up to his blocked attack.

Blinded by the light thrown off by the card, Vincent had to squint, then shield his eyes in pain for an instant.

The Death Dealer kept its card showing, and Vincent heard a rustling in back of him. Knowing that the second Dealer was nowhere to be found after the first shot, he had an inkling as to where it was.

Vincent spun around toward the sound, and though the blinding light still shone from what was his back now, he could see two projectiles coming after him.

One card turned into a volley of eight swords flying through the air, their speed increased by addition of the second card, namely, the steadfast direction of The Chariot running behind them, the illusory, ghostly charioteer whipping at the flying weapons, and urging them forward even faster.

Vincent stood his ground, knowing that dodging the cards were useless. Like heat-seeking missles, the cards would follow their victim until they were destroyed, or their victim was dead.

Vincent let loose another shot, and both illusions disappeared. Two perfectly halved cards flittered down to the ground. Not only did the shot go right through both cards thrown by the second Dealer, but also the Dealer itself. Clutching its heart, it stumbled backward a step or two, went down on one knee, then faded out, returning to the Lifestream from where it was born.

Not missing a beat, Vincent spun around again, and shot at the first Dealer, making it have to move enough to have to put away its blinding Hidden Sun card.

The Dealer cut his deck again, and pulled out another card, the Ace of Wands. Vincent raised his weapon as an illusory wooden staff formed in the Dealer's hand.

Vincent fired, and the Dealer waved his wand. Bullet and fiery magical spell met in the middle, and cancelled one another out.

The Dealer waved his wand again. This time, it was certainly Vincent's turn to dodge the attack. Vincent could just hear Chaos inside himself screaming, waiting for the marksman to kill something, anything, merely so it had something...anything...with which to tear to pieces.

Trying to supress Chaos almost cost Vincent his life. An almost-too-late-dodge caused a magical spell to graze him, searing the sleeve of his jacket.

After dodging another spell, Vincent picked up on the fact that the Wand card was weakening...it took longer and longer for the Dealer to cast its deadly fiery spell.

Vincent took advantage of the weakening Card, and aimed again, but not at the Dealer himself, but at the staff if the Dealer's hand. He fired, and before the Dealer could cast another spell, the staff disappeared, and another perfectly halved card fluttered to the ground.

The Dealer reached for yet another card, and Vincent made sure to shoot the dealer's hand right through before he even got to touch a claw to another card. The Dealer flinched back, dropping his cards and bringing the clawed hand that previously held the deck up to his injured hand.

The cards from the dropped deck swirling around him, Vincent aimed lastly for the Dealer's heart. After laying another bullet square in the Dealer's chest, it also stumbled back, and disappeared along with its cards into oblivion, just like his partner in crime.

_ I would think The Tower is the most suitable card for the both of them now_, he thought.

Looking over at Barret, he began running over to help his comrade in fighting the foul-smelling Malboro monster. With remedies from the Malboro's poisons in painfully short supply, the plant monster was now the most dangerous threat to all of them.

On the way towards Barret, Vincent was almost tackled by Cid, who was on the way down from another phenomenal leap in an attempt to dodge another Flare spell released by the King Behemoth he had been fighting. Knocked a bit off balance by a need for a quick dodge, the pilot landed almost right on top of the suited man, landing much less gracefully than he usually did.

After the Flare spell had dissipated, the two men could see the long, deeply burned scar in the ground remaning from it. Vincent turned his attention from the curling smoke rising from the ground, to Cid Highwind, who was angrily shaking a gloved fist at the monster. "You stupid bastard! I don't want a_ light_, I want my goddamned ciggie stub back!"

Vincent closed his eyes and sighed at his comrade. "I am looking forward to a helping of hot herbal tea after this. Preferably something calming, like chamomile."

"Get the hell outta here!" said Cid jokingly, as he turned back and looked up at Vincent. A charming, though nicoteine-stained grin grew across his face. "This work ain't worth just some foo-foo-shee-shee herbal goddamned tea!" The pilot picked himself up from the ground, complaining that "at times like this, he really frickin' missed Shera", and both men parted ways.

Vincent reached Barret's side, and was greeted by a grinning thumbs-up from the big guy. Immediately, they both opened fire at the Malboro, but their weapons continued to only damage it in increments, their bullets sinking into the plant creature's slimy coating.

"Watch out!" they heard Cid yell, and both men turned to look at him. "I really pissed 'im off now!" he added, as the King Behemoth's torso was shaking violently, and its tail began to emit blue electricity.

Vincent grit his teeth. He knew this was the creature summoning its magic. "Comet."

A screaming sound was heard a far distance above them, and the three of them looked upward to see red-rimmed spots of darkness hanging in the sky. The magic invoked was heating up the air, and the dark spots were getting larger, and larger.

The comets were approaching them.


	31. Chapter 31

**Authoress' Note:** Thanks to Kira van de Vooren, without whose help you probably wouldn't be able to read this. Stupid freaking file names. I HATE HTML!

Chapter 31.

A dark, etheric cloud in the barely distinguishable form of a skull hung over the off-white pillow in which Tifa's head rested. The skull's maw was nearly fully open, waiting to take in the soul of the Curse spell's victim.

Tifa's usually lily-white skin was now tinged with a shade of charcoal grey, and her hands, of which one bore the now blackened, tarnished-looking engagement ring, were folded neatly on her stomach. She continued to lie caught in demonic coma. The Curse spell was taking its toll, and her breathing had become deathly quieted and slowed.

Blonde hair lay across her folded hands, and a silently tearing Cloud had his face buried in the downy bed next to Tifa's side.

The useless Holy Torch that Cloud had tried to activate over and over, desperately trying to save the young woman's life, lay broken in half on the other side of the room. Cloud had, in his fury caused by the Torch's lack of cooperation, broken it in one hand, then thrown it against the wall. It was a dud.

The sky reddened and heated as the comets whistled toward the ground, and Cid and his friends could smell the noxious odor of sulfur getting stronger and stronger.

Barret turned around when he caught an even more offensive odor coming from the direction of the monstrous Malboro. It was now taking the opportunity to envelop the feet of the two distracted men quickly in a green cloud of poison. He called over to Vincent. "YO!" he said, waving his gunarm in the direction of the plant. "Stinkin' thang just cast BIO!"

The compending difficulties were starting to begin to wear on Vincent's patience, and rattling his cool exterior. "We must get away from the poison. The comets can be avoided, but the poison cannot be cured anyti-!"

Suddenly, Vincent was hefted into the air, and dangled seemingly weightless above the maw of the plant. Barret could see that the Malboro used its own poisonous gas to cover a well-placed tentacle that, in turn, lifted Vincent up off the ground. It threw VIncent around in the air a bit. However, Vincent buried his golden metal claw deeply into the meat of the tentacle, and little puffs of sickeningly brownish gas escaped from the puncture sites. Sheer will power made him hold on, preventing his ankle from being shattered to pieces by the flailing tentacle that held it.

Barret heard a solid _thunk_ ahead of him, and sure enough, the smoking Cerberus lie a short distance from his massive booted feet. It had been knocked out of the hand of a thoroughly caught off-guard Vincent. "Damn thing must've been a student of ShinRa or somethin' to think'a _that_," spat Barret angrily at the Malboro, as the gas continued to swirl upwards, and the comets continued to scream downwards.

Cid defiantly placed a hand on a hip as the lumbering King Behemoth thundered toward him. When Cid could just about see the angry reddish light of the comets the monster summoned reflected in the tips of its horns, he crouched, preparing himself to gracefully propel himself upwards. He tightened his grip on the Venus Gospel, both hands white-knuckled.

As he was preparing for one of his gravity-defying dragoon jumps, a haggard, tired Phil happened to streak by, crossing in front of the very path now taken by the King Behemoth. Two very hungry bandersnatches continued to race after the trainee, their white teeth bared and ready to tear through their meal.

Compeltely annoyed, Cid's concentration on his jump was broken and he turned his attention angrily toward his student. "HEY!" he called toward Phil's back, "Stay outta my goddamned WAY!"

"I'm sorry, Captain!" breathlessly called the student over his shoulder, his arms and legs pumping as he ran for dear life.

Cid saw his student trip, and clumsily fall to the ground head-first. The pilot shook his head. _One of these days, I gotta teach him some style,_ thought Cid to himself as he saw the bandersnatches cross directly in front of him, quickly approaching the downed student.

The pilot looked upward, grinning. He kept his hand in his pocket, and continued to watch both the sky and the approaching demonic wolves nonchalantly.

No sooner did the bandersnatches practically reach Cid's side, when the earth shook. One of them screamed, roared in pain as it was instantly flattened by a red-hot comet. Its limbs stuck out from underneath the heavy rock in all four directions, then disappeared as the monster was returned to the Lifestream.

Cid saw his student sit up, then grin in an almost euphoric stupor for half an instant, then realize in terror that he still had one more wolf-demon to go. Quickly Phil picked himself up and made off, seemingly faster than one of the Cerberus's bullets, in an effort to get away from the unflappable remaining bandersnatch.

The pilot returned his attention to the King Behemoth, squinting at it. He had a plan. Dodging a comet, he prepared to jump again as the King Behemoth continued to approach, horns lowered, charging mercilessly. Using one of the now cooled comets as a stepping stone, he leaped up and flew clear over the creatures' back as it ran forward blindly. He thrusted the Venus Gospel squarely in the creature's tail, canceling everything of its magical power.

The unhappy King Behemoth stopped when it reached the downed comets. It roared in frustration, and flicked its tail, along with Cid, upward.

Cid was ready for it. Going along with the tail's force, he doubled back and successfully pinned it to the creature's head with the Venus Gospel. He clung to the Venus Gospel, burying it deeper and deeper into the back of the monster's head while it thrashed, unable to throw off the deathblow.

Cid grinned devilishly. He released his weapon, jumped off the monster's head, and landed gracefully back to the soft grass, while rolling quickly to dodge another comet. Straightening up, he looked back at the agonized monster, knowing he only had to wait a moment for it return to the Lifestream.

Phil continued to race, knowing that trying to tire the remaining bandersnatch was a losing battle. What was more, the whole field was wide open, and there were no trees to climb or work with, either. As Phil ran, he neared a cliff-ridden area that what he figured had to be near the coastline. He had to stop dead, skidding to a halt, in front of a sheer dropoff. At the bottom of the dropoff seemed to be a shallow pool of water.

Phil turned back toward the approaching demonic wolf as it flew toward him. In desperation, he knelt down, peering into the deep hole before him. Seeing a small ledge below him, he leaped down, disappearing into the hole.

The bandersnatch, compeltely blind to the dropoff due to its speed, figured the land simply went downhill, and it continued to race after its victim.

In too high of a gear to make a sudden enough stop, it yelped as it ran out of ground to run on. It flew over Phil's head, hung in the air for a moment. Its beady black eyes went wide in terror. It then became the victim of sheer gravity, and began to fall downwards, continuing seemingly hundreds of feet towards the water below. Phil heard a sorry-sounding whimper, then a solid-sounding splash in the water below.

He breathed heavily, wiping the sweat off his brow, and sunk downwards. He sat on the mossy ledge while recovering from his pursuit, too exhausted right now to even give himself a pat on the back for surviving the pursuing bandersnatches.

"Barret!" called Vincent, hanging upside-down above the huge maw of the Malboro by a claw and an ankle. "Don't pick it up! You'll get poisoned!"

Barret looked up at him, shaking his gun arm at him furiously. "YO!" he yelled. "Better I get a little sick than you gettin' a little EATEN!"

Vincent's brow lowered in irritation as he saw Barret race through the gas towards his weapon. The gas had by now risen up and begun to dissipate, and its bulk now reached the top of the big man's head, no doubt beginning to poison him badly.

The ex-Turk felt a painful jerk in his leg. The tentacle was continuing to move him over the Malboro's mouth, ready to drop him in. He began to furiously claw at the tentacle, hoping it would annoy the plant enough to release him. Rivulets of awgul-smelling brown liquid poured from the wounds on the tentacle as Vincent swiped and swung at it. Becoming increasingly annoyed by Chaos' fury, clawing at the tentacle was all he could do to keep himself sane.

Below him, Barret's eyes began to tear as he moved through the gas, dodging no less than three giant comets in the short distance between himself and the Cerberus. Once he reached the weapon, he scooped it up with his natural arm, and with a cough, gave it a mighty toss.

Above, Vincent stifled the tentacle for a second by practically clawing it clean through, though he was now suspended perilously close to the Malboro's mouth. Checking back toward Barret, and seeing a glimmer of shimmering red come near him, he reached out his own intact hand, and caught his favored weapon just in time. Deftly, he spun it around and laid a finger on the trigger. Shooting the Malboro point-blank in the mouth, he caused it severe agony, and the monster flinched, then screamed and hissed loudly. It released his ankle, and threw him a distance, well away from the green cloud of poison. Vincent landed gracefully on his feet close to Cid.

Cid gave his comrade an encouraging grin as the body of the dead King Behemoth fell neatly before him with a loud _thud_. Vincent nodded in response as the pilot removed his weapon from the head of the monster with a sickening _thock_, and the body of the King Behemoth vaporized into ether. Both men then turned quickly back toward the Malboro.

Cid, seeing only a translucent veil of green, and Barret running within it toward the monster, knew that Barret had to be in bad shape by now. Knowing that his friend had now been possibly irreparably poisoned shot his nerves straight to hell.

Vincent's teeth ground together. He saw Barret run right up to the stunned monster.

Barret, compeltely careless with himself now, figured that now, since he was a goner from the noxious gas anyway, he could at least stop it from pursuing his friends.

Reaching the face of the disgusting plant, he raised his gun-arm, and pressed it flat against the monster's head, glaring intently at the recovering Malboro.

The Missing Score turned on its axis, and a reddish glow lighted up within it. "Take_ this_, ya damned Chia Pet-on-acid," he growled.

Cid and Vincent heard a terrible explosion, and, as the last of the poison gas dissipated, they saw a shadow of a coughing Barret, standing, then going down on one knee, in the midst of the quickly vaporizing, slimy, putrid remains of the Malboro.

"Shit," cursed Cid, unable to know what else to say.

Vincent pressed his lips together. "We must get to that inn quickly."

They all had even more pieces to pick up now than ever before.


	32. Chapter 32

Chapter 32.

Cloud sniffed in his tears, and ran his hands through his hair. Picking his head up from the bed, he wiped his forehead with a hand, trying desperately to think of a way to cure Tifa, though now thinking was useless, as the battles, tension, and emotional rollercoaster had certainly by now taken its toll.

He looked at his fiancee. Her breathing was almost at a standstill now. Cloud grimaced at the awful specter of the skull that hung red-eyed above Tifa's head.

He was ready to try and curse the disgusting shadow into oblivion, when the flashes of light he saw from out of the window on Tifa's opposite side caught his attention. They were in the direction that from which he was sure the rest of his friends were approaching. He's seen it too many times before.

He pressed his lips together, torn now between waiting for help for his fiance, and running out of the room to aid his friends, who by the looks of the light flashing in the distance, could also be in danger. Yuffie was here already; he knew the rest of them wouldn't be far behind her.

Cloud returned his gaze to Tifa. Waiting...what am I waiting for...?

Resigned to the fact that there was nothing he could do for Tifa now, he arose, and left the room, but not before leaving an intense kiss on her cold, soft lips, and whispering a soft pleading for forgiveness in her ear.

As he made his way out the door, he never noticed the blackened ring on Tifa's finger turning a faint shade of green, and never saw the glowing mist rising from it.

Leaving Tifa's room, and meeting positively no one from room to main entrance, Cloud released a sigh of irritation. The inn was now abandoned, and figured that everyone had seen the light in the distance and had abandoned the inn, not understanding that this was most likely a spell not near the caliber of the dreaded Meteor that had threatened the Planet before.

He made his way out the main entrance, and headed towards the shoreline, never noticing a repentant, melancholic Yuffie leaning against the furthest side of the inn, watching him, sighing deeply, then resolvedly following him once he fell a distance ahead.

He hated himself for leaving her, but he knew he'd hate himself for staying there, too. There was no one to stay by Tifa's side. Cloud's brow furrowed. He should be the one back there, by her side. But...what to do there but wait for her to die? That was absolutely out of the question. If Tifa ever got healed, she would hate him for just sitting there while his friends could use his help. She had stayed with him while he was poisoned with Mako, but that would be something she would never, ever expect in return.

Cloud sighed again. Aeris, then Tifa.

But...look at Aeris, he thought to himself. She's now powerful. She's one with the Lifestream and the Planet. She's the most powerful summon ever acquired by humans. Maybe Tifa's lot in the afterlife would prove the same!

He shook his head. What was he thinking? No, there is something...he could do...he could do for her now...

...no.

No, there wasn't...

Which, he berated himself, made it all the more anathema to leave her. But then, latching on to a glimmer of hope, he knew that if he helped his friends, they'd do anything...anything...to help her.

Only now, there was nothing to be done...

...and so the vicious dance of Cloud's thoughts spun around, and around, in his head. Because, after all, Cloud was, and would always be, his own worst enemy...

Green energy gathered around Tifa's now-dark ring, and a musical theme containing clear, happy, melodic little bells could be heard.

The energy left the ring, then swirled around the bed next to Tifa's form. From the ground up, the energy congealed into a glistening dress, a green-tinted auburn braid, and a lovely, ruby-lipped face crowned with a tiara seemingly made entirely of emeralds.

Aeris adjusted her dress a bit, then gazed down at her comrade. She gently took hold of Tifa's hand, and both their hands glowed a faint green.

"Dear...?

Looking up, she noticed the angry, red-eyed, ghostly skull, and, with the slightest note of irritation, closed her eyes, turned up her nose, and swung her free hand toward it. The skull's mouth opened wide, and it let loose a silent scream, thoroughly annoyed that its food, the soul of its victim, had been taken away from it.

Aeris's hand instantly dissipated the skull. "WE...are going to have to have a little talk when you reenter the Lifestream!" said the ethereal girl, with a hint of haughtiness.

"Ahem!"

She sat herself down on the bed. She leaned closer in towards Tifa, and whispered in her ear, a mischevious smirk on her lips. "Dear, will you please wake up? Cait Sith just struck it rich at the Gold Saucer...and he wants to buy the Cloud Nine!"

Tifa's eyes shot open, and her head flew up off her pillow. "Reeve!" she yelped. "No, Reeve is absolutely not going to-!"

She opened her eyes slowly, seeing a figure in the haze before her. As it cleared, she gasped. Gazing into the emerald-hued face of her long-lost friend stunned her into silence. Dumbfounded, she looked down, and noticed Aeris holding her hand.

She looked back up into Aeris' motherly, yet calmly euphoric gaze.

"I'm dead...," was all she managed to say as she looked around. Turning back toward Aeris, she teared up. "I'm dead! Aren't I!"

Aeris smiled broadly, and chuckled softly and sweetly.

Cloud broke into a run. The stark scenery flew past him as the Mako within him propelled his legs faster than other humans who happened not to have ever been used as a science experiment.

Soon enough, over the horizon, he caught a glimpse of four figures.

Relieved that the four of them were OK for now, he halted and put his hands on his hip in an effort to catch his breath. The figures steadily approached him, and his brow furrowed when he saw Vincent and Phil supporting a greenish, sick-looking Barret.

Cid was the first to approach him, and he rested his Venus Gospel on his shoulder as he smiled at Cloud.

"She's-?" was all the pilot could say, in the hopes that Cloud's silence was masking exhuberant joy at Tifa's recovery.

Cloud's lips pursed together. The edges of his mouth downturned, his gaze toward the ground.

The blond man's utter silence terrified all four of them. "The Holy Torch...?" interjected Vincent.

Cloud's face became thoroughly pained, and he looked as if he were to break down any second. "Dud..." he whispered, turning his head toward the horizon on his right.

"Damnit..." said Barret quietly, and he coughed up a storm. Vincent and Phil had to brace him.

Cloud's attention was turned back toward Barret. His face further darkened as he could tell that the big man had poison running through him. Right now, the poison was as incurable as Tifa's Curse. "Barret, I-"

"Shu'up." Barret, showing fraternal annoyance at Cloud's concern, snapped his attention behind Cloud, his gaze fixed on Yuffie, a little ways behind Cloud's back. Unaware that she had been behind him, following him the entire time in total silence, Cloud's eyes went wide when he turned to see her there.

"Girl gave 'er a crappy Torch," growled Barret. "Maybe if it weren't fer-"

"Barret, for the last time, shut the hell up!" reprimanded Cid, and not in a friendly fashion. Barret, wanting to make his point known, continued to rant and rave about Yuffie's questionable acts the past few days. Everything began with her, and-

"SHADDAP!" snapped Cid, his eyes closed. He reached back, and ran a hand through his hair. "There's...always somethin' we can do." His hand flew away from his head, and he pointed a finger furiously at Barret. "And the right thing fer YOU to do is keep your damn mouth SHUT so that poison doesn't get through ya any faster than it should!"

Barret stumbled for a moment, and Vincent and Phil had to work hard to keep him from falling over. "I...I just want Tifa to be awright," he said quietly, but he could not tear his angry gaze from Yuffie.

Yuffie stepped forward. "I've been wrong," she said simply. "Really wrong."

Cid walked up to her. His anger now a bit cooled. "You know what? I agree with him. You've been pretty damned stupid," he said, now pointing a finger at her. "But you've made your case that you're a different person than ya were a few days ago. People...they can change fer the better," he said, and felt a stabbing pain when he remembered how awful he was to Shera in the past. "People...can be better. They just...need a kick in the ass sometimes to do it."

Yuffie crossed her arms. "What should we do now?"

Cloud looked toward the inn, now a ways in the distance. "I could call around...see if anyone's got the stuff we need. I'll tell them we're willing to pay whatever they want."

"That's about all we can do for now. The moment someone finds a lead as to where we can get a Holy Torch and a vial of Esuna potion, we will leave immediately."

They all turned toward the inn, and began walking toward it. Unconsciously or not, Yuffie was left far behind them.

Vincent caught Cid's eye, and signaled for him to take over supporting Barret. Cid did so, and Vincent fell backward, and accompanied Yuffie.

Yuffie looked aside angrily. "You're not embarrased to walk with me?"

Vincent kept looking straight forward. "No," he said, simply and quietly.

"Why?" Yuffie begged, turning toward the tall ex-Turk. "Why are you always the first to defend me anymore!" Her face reddened. "Why!"

Vincent cooly examined the horizon while he spoke. "I recognized that look in your eyes when we landed on the shore of Wutai. That look of irreplaceable loss. And anger. And utter frustration that the loss couldn't be helped."

Yuffie cast her eyes down, though they were widened in shock at Vincent's accurate read.

"I recognize it because I'm living it...or, unliving it, now. And loss has two possible effects on a person. It either makes them immersed in bitterness, absorbed in their own personal hate, or it makes them stronger. It either creates the most hateful internal demons, or it heals everyone else around them."

Vincent's voice softened even more. "I have taken the former path, and I want you to take the latter."

Yuffie stopped in her tracks, absorbing what her comrade was saying.

"Whatever you do, Yuffie...do not end up like me," he said to her, over his shoulder.

The young ninja couldn't help but ponder a few moments, as Vincent and the rest of the party continued forward towards the inn. She remembered how she saw Chaos ripping through his body and consciousness, and his words terrified her. She knew she had practically the same level of anger and frustration contained within herself. She balled her fists, and stomped the ground. No, she resolved. That will NOT happen to me!

After a long moment, she realized how far she was behind the rest of the guys, but it took no time at all for her to catch back up.

As he was a little ways ahead, everyone saw Cloud stopped in his tracks for a moment, and looked around, puzzled. The rest of the men seemed to think he was searching for something specific.

Cid drew up by his side. "What?"

"A disturbance..." Cloud's brow furrowed as his voice trailed off. "I swear, I felt...something like a tremor..."

"Aeris..I-!"

"You're not dead, dear." She smiled even more broadly. "In fact, I'd say you're good to go for another couple decades or so!" Her brow furrowed as she further reprimanded Tifa. She waved a finger back and forth in front of herself. "As long as you two stay outta trouble, you know. I've heard nothing but endless complaints from the Lifestream about the times when I've been away from it like that!"

Tifa grasped Aeris' tiny hand in both her own hands now. "How did you know I was so badly off? I don't have any summon materia like Cloud does."

Aeris winked and silently pointed down at her hand, and specifically, the hand bearing Cloud's ring. Tifa examined the ring, and slowly, it had turned from black, to a bright, silvery mythril-tinted white. Even the stone looked perfect and brilliant now that the metal was back to normal.

"That ring isn't just for him, dear. It's also for you."

Tifa couldn't help to pause in awe for a moment. "Aeris..thank you...thank you so much." She couldn't help but to lean over and take her former comrade, now her summon entity, in her arms, and give her a warm embrace. She noticed that Aeris felt neither warm nor cold, and though she was sure her arms were going to pass right through her, she found it easy to cling to her shoulders. Aeris had been as solid as when she hugged Marlene.

She had to hold on to her even closer as a sudden, tremorous shaking rattled the entire inn.

Aeris slowly released Tifa, looking compeltely puzzled for a moment after the tremor. "I want all of you to take care of one another. I want all of you to be good with one another." Gazing intently into Tifa's dark ruby eyes, she added, "I want you two to have forever together." Aeris grimaced and looked to the side for a moment, her face contorted in fury. "And even though at this very moment the rest of them are arguing and acting worse than children," her expression softened as she looked back towards Tifa, "they'll make sure the Planet is beautiful again. Just like it was ages ago."

Another tremor shook the inn. Knick-knacks took a nosedive from their places on the shelves. A picture frame fell off the wall, and glass shattered and spread about the carpt when the frame hit the floor.

For the first time, Tifa noticed Aeris looking a little...flustered. "What IS that?" she asked herself as she held out her hand. "I can usually read these kind of things..." She looked up to Tifa for an instant. "But I can't read this..."

Greenish energy seemd to wisp off her, and became a flowing, ribbony wave in her hand. The wave fluttered around like a fish in water, spinning around and around within the width of Aeris' tiny hand.

Aeris' emerald eyes went wide. "What!" She paused to watch the ribbon move in the palm of her hand. "You want to know where I am? You...miss me?" The ribbon of Lifestream above her hand spun around, swimming in the air agitatedly.

A roaring tremor begun again, this time throwing Tifa off the bed, onto the floor. Aeris floated upwards, hovering above and remained unaffected by the tremors.

Tifa saw Aeris' face grow desperate as she continued to communicate with the Lifestream ribbon. "Oh...Oh no! You're coming to find me! OK, I promise I'll be right with you! Let me explain first! Leave now and I will follow shortly." She waved her hand holding the Lifestream ribbon, and it dissipated into mist instantly.

Tifa looked around, disturbed. "The guys must be in trouble again! I have to go find them!"

Aeris floated downwards toward Tifa, and lovingly took both her hands. "No...it's...it's me! I must go now! There is a problem in summoning me...the Planet cannot sustain my presence for very long, and I fear it will shatter if I don't leave!"

Tifa grasped her hands in return. "But...can't you stay long enough for everyone to see you one more time!"

Aeris shook her head quickly. "No!" she insisted desperately. "The Lifestream is acting rather quickly and impatiently this time! It will break through the earth any second to come looking for me. Just be careful when it does! I'm so sorry!" She closed her eyes apologetically. "Being one of the most powerful entities in the universe really has its disadvantages sometimes!"

"But...Aeris..."

"Let me tell you something before I go...The Lifestream will surface also near Cloud, since he has it within him, too. You must tell him about this. I will tell the Lifestream about Barret.

"The Lifestream will shatter the ground it arises from, but it will only be looking for me. I know about everyone, and the Lifestream will handle it...so please don't worry!" Aeris released Tifa's hands, and desperately began to float upwards, repeating "I'm SO sorry! I'm really really sorry!" as she disappeared.

Left sitting on the floor, Tifa hardly had time to absorb her friend's last few words, when a mighty, violent shaking compeltely tore apart the inn. The sound was deafening. Wood splintered off everywhere, and Tifa was thrown into a corner, her head bouncing hard off a bureau.

When she regained her senses, she rubbed her head a bit, and re-established her bearings. She shakily stood on her feet.

Before her was a massive rift in the earth's crust, one that rent the room she was in clean in half. At the bottom of the rift, glowing greenish Lifestream could be seen pulsating impatiently, and wisps of energy were rising. The scene was eerily familiar, as the rift looked not unlike the center of the Planet, which the entire gang had visited before.

Tifa was awed by the force of the lonely, misguided Lifestream, lost without its "mother". The ghostly greenish light slowly wound its way upwards toward Tifa. She could only watch, fascinated, then flinch back as a bit of the energy came close to her, brushing her cheek softly. She raised a hand up to touch it, and it wound softly around her hand. Electricity, sorrow, and love could all be felt at once, both on the skin of Tifa's hand, and her soul.

Not finding who it was looking for, the Lifestream retreated slowly, and returned to the rift below.

Another earthquake begun, and Tifa could see a line of rifts tearing along the ground, southward toward the beach on which her and Cloud had surfaced days ago.

Knowing that the rifts were heading for Cloud, she deftly climbed downwards, using poles of now shattered lumber to richochet herself to the ground. Once she hit the dirt, she began running, following the line of explosions, and all the while, trying to dodge the bottomless rifts caused by the Lifestream, jumping gracefully over them as she ran towards her friends.

She found she couldn't keep up with the steadily lengthening line of rifts. THey were heading toward the shore, and she could only hope that the guys could avoid them when they ripped under their feet.

Especially Cloud's feet.

Cid released Barret temporarily to join Cloud, who he glared at in disbelief. "What's wrong with you?" he asked pointedly. "I don't hear nothin'."

Vincent caught up to Cid's side while Cloud ended up walking over to the group's left, still listening. "He has Mako running through him...more than even myself. He's more in tune with the Planet than anyone else right now." Barret coughed in the background.

Cloud's eyes went wide. He heard a thunderous series of explosions drawing nearer, and nearer. Then, in the distance, he could see dirt shooting up into the sky, and no sooner than that the ground under them shook violently.

"Run!" Cloud ordered once the horrible tremor was over. Realizing that Barret would be severely handicapped, they all dropped back and took his pace, which was damningly slow compared to the advancing earthy explosions.

Looking back over his shoulder, Cloud could see the feathery energy of the Lifestream emerging from the craters that had been torn in the Planet's surface. The Lifestream! Has it gone crazy! he thought, then faced forward to continue with everyone else.

It was all too late. The earth buckled and roared under them, and soon enough, the ground gave way, as if a gigantic claw dig itself in before them and ripped the ground backwards, toward the group. Barret, too ill to stay on his feet, and exhausted from running, resignedly began to fall downwards. Phil, falling even faster, had nothing else to cling to as he fell other than one of Barret's heavy boots.

Vincent was the first to regain enough presence of mind catch him, latching onto his heavy denim jacket with his powerful golden claw arm. However, the ground gave way underneath him, also. Cloud, managing to stay on stable ground, grasped Vincent's intact hand, and pulled with all his might, sliding his heels along the ground. The soles of his boots bit into the dirt to try and stop the three of them from falling into the seemingly bottomless, Mako-filled rift in the ground. Theonly thing that prevented three men from falling into the greenish haze below was the fact that Cloud had become so unusually strong through ShinRa's experiments on him.

Cid ran up alongside Cloud, and also grasped onto Vincent's free arm. "He's dead weight down there," said Cid, annoyed. "He's probably out cold...him, the newbie, and Vincent combined are too damn heavy to just yank out!"

"Cloud! There are no footholds down here! And if I transform, I'll lose my hold of Barret!" called out Vincent from below. Not to mention...my mind...! he darkly added, thinking to himself.

Everyone was at a standstill, a terrified pilot trainee holding onto the boot of an unconscious Barret, Barret hanging over the edge of oblivion by a golden claw, which had begun tearing through the dark, tattered denim jacket. Vincent holding on to Cloud by a thread, caught between the massive weight of Barret and Phil combined, and the hand trying to pull him upwards, to no use.

Vincent called up again after taking a glance at the wall which supported the ground on which both Cloud and Cid stood. "The ground, Cloud! The ground beneath you! I can see it crumbling underneath your feet! It's unstable!"

"Gee, thanks!" called back Cid, peeved and worried.

Cloud's eyes squeezed shut as he and Cid began to pull on Vincent's hand. "GODDAMNIT!" yelled Cloud, tears finally refusing to be held back any longer. I'm NOT losing everyone...in one day! he cried, screamed, wailed, to himself.


	33. Chapter 33

Chapter 33.

Cloud adjusted his grip on Vincent's arm, his boots digging deeper and deeper into the unstable ground.

"'ey, how 'bout on the count of three we both yank all these guys out?"

Cloud, quickly becoming exhausted despite the incredible strength due to his Mako engineering, could only nod in approval of the Captain's plan.

"One...Two...!" counted Cid.

Just then, the abyss opened wider, and the ground fell away. Both men had to jump backward to avoid falling into the abyss below themselves. Below them, Vincent grunted, also getting overstrained himself.

"FRICKIN' GROUND!" spat Cid, wanting to shake an angry fist at the situation, but found his hands too full right now to do so. "I didn't even get ta count to three!" He recollected himself, and glanced over to a practically overstrained, exhausted Cloud. Cloud was now bearing the brunt of the chain's weight, and the scientific engineering he received from Shinra was the only thing that made bearing all that weight possible now.

"Let's try that again," continued Cid.

Not even getting to _one_ yet, Cid noticed Cloud's grip on the chain slackening for an instant. His eyes widened, and he looked like he wasn't bearing any weight at all for a moment. He gave a cry, and took four complete steps backward, all on his own power.

Cid's eyes widened, too, and he gripped Vincent's arm tighter after the strange distraction caused by the change in Cloud's demeanor. "...the hell did ya do _that_!" he demanded.

Cloud's eyes phased out again in seeming deep thought. "Three are now nearer...a fourth is awakening... I-"

The pilot shook his head. "Now, now. You ain't gonna go doin' that goofy kneeling-down-head-clutching-headache thing again, are ya? This is a REALLY...BAD...TIME for that!"

Cloud shook his head slowly, while occaionally grunting from the strain of the weight. "No...two...are..."

And suddenly, he felt two strong hands covering his own.

Cloud looked to his left. The gloves were red. The arms were lily white.

Tears began to form in Cloud's eyes.

Beautiful lily white arms.

Phil was sweating. He was hanging on to Barret's boot as best as he could. He said a silent prayer in thanksgiving that the bootlaces were tied so tight on the big guy's feet. And that they were strong. Really strong.

He tried to scramble upwards, however, being no athelete, the effort only ended up making him slip downwards to an even more precarious position, and could have made the folks on the ground above him lose their balance. It was best to just hang on while he could.

And that's when he heard a most awful *pop!* coming from the boot he clung to.

Phil looked at the boot laces, and sure enough, there between the third and fourth holes, a frighteningly large fray could be seen. Phil tried to wake up the big guy, but the poison had obviously done its job-Barret was out like a light.

Phil clung even tighter on to the boot, and could hear another *pop!* coming from the boot. The dirt from the shelf above him was falling into his face, making it even more difficult to keep calm.

And he ended up falling, one precious inch nearer to the scary green stuff below. The boot was becoming quickly undone!

The trainee looked downward. That greenish ooze seemed to be getting closer! He panicked for a moment, as the fluid seemed to be rising up to him...or maybe he was falling to his death, and didn't know it! He considered trying to climb up the chain, but feeling the boot slide further off Barret's foot stopped him immediately from doing anything else rash.

He squeezed his eyes shut, in part because of not being able to wipe the sweat pouring from his brow, and also out of sheer terror. He relaxed a bit. Maybe this would all go away if he just concentrated.

Opening his eyes, he saw his situation didn't change. The nightmare continued. And that he was even closer now to that greenish stuff than ever before.

...Or, was it closer to him?...

He blinked. Yes, in fact, he noted his position didn't change at all...but the green stuff was rising, coming straight for him!

The boot slipped another inch. Phil gasped and looked upwards, then downwards again.

A ribbon of green luminescence was coming towards him. The tip of the light went right up to him, and Phil forgot his situation for a moment, transfixed on the curious-looking fold of Lifestream before him.

It enveloped him, and for once, he felt the strangest sensation he had ever felt. He almost voluntarily let go of his hold on Barret's boot because of it. The green stuff caused him to feel empowered, strengthened...and he could hear delicate, beautiful music-like voices when it surrounded his head. It was utterly intoxicating.

The ribbon pulled away. It seemed, dog-like, to lose interest in him, and continued growing upwards. It prodded Barret for a minute, then, acting like it recognized him, surrounded him instantly in a shroud of light, and disappeared into his dark ebony skin. It surrounded his weapon, too, and Phil could see a mighty greenish light emanating from the Missing Score on his arm.

Barret stirred above him. He snuffed and sniffled a bit...then, to Phil's utter shock began to chuckle. A light, airy, childlike laugh was heard.

Barret suddenly kicked his feet this way and that, and it made Phil scream in terror as he just barely held on. Phil could see his head turning this way and that, then all of a sudden, talking out loud to no one.

"-Wha? Sheesh, that wuz weird. Where am I?...What the f-!...Holy crap!...Huh? You wan' me to shoot? In here?" Phil could see him taking a puzzled glance at his gunarm. "Ya sure!...Well...OK, sounds good to me!"

Phil called upwards. "Hey! You're alright!"

"Yeah, lil' man! called Barret downwards. "You gotta hol' on like you never held on before! This gunarm got quite a kick the way it is!"

Phil went pale. The boot slipped another inch, and he scrambled upward in a last effort to prepare him for whatever Barret and the greenish stuff below him was planning.

Cid was shocked to see Tifa standing there next to Cloud, her brow deeply furrowed in concentration. "Cloud! Let's count to three and pull together!"

Cid grinned from ear to ear. "I have no idea how you got here, now, but I'll tell ya one thing...I like lovely ladies who think like me!" he said laughingly.

"One!" counted Tifa, desperately.

Cid then heard a most horrible screeching in the distance. He snapped his head to look to his right, and there was Yuffie, yelling "WAAAAAAAAAAAAAIT for MEEEEEE!" as she ran toward them, then sliding to a halt.

She leaned over the edge of the percipice and easily sized up the situation by what she saw. "Holy crap, that SUCKS!" She ran back to the worried three at the top of the chain, and grabbed hold of Cloud's glove, yanking backward with all her might.

"Hey...hey Captain!" She managed to get a few words out in between exaggerated huffs of panted breath. "I have..I have...an idea! Let's all yank 'em out...at once...when I count to three!"

"CRIPES!" yelled Cid with sudden explicable fury. "What the hell you think we were doin' for the last-!"

"-_Cid_!" angrily reprimanded Tifa.

"We should let the ninja girl count. She's got the biggest mouth!" howled Cid.

"You should be the last one to talk, you chain-smoking, air-headed astronaut wanna-be!"

Cloud shifted a little. "Um...guys..." he said, barely audibly, and the sheer softness of it got the attention of his three helpers. "...help?"

Tifa easily assessed Cloud's discomfort. She was also the only one presently doing so. She scowled again, but now at both the pilot and the ninja girl. "_Guys! We have a _crisis _here_!"

Just then, three loud counts were heard at the bottom of the chain.

"Who the hell was THAT!" snapped Cid.

"That sounded like...Barret!" said Tifa, her ruby eyes widened.

Cid's jaw tightened in disbelief. "BARRET? I thought he was-"

Cloud closed his eyes. He knew they were all here. Tifa, Cid, Barret, Vincent, Phil, Yuffie, the Lifestream...

...and _her_.

He released his deathgrip of Vincent's arm. He fell to the ground all the way, completely deaf to Cid's furious rage at his release of Vincent.

Everything flashed greenish-white for a slip second.

"Oh, no!" Yuffie snapped her head toward the blinding light that seemed to originate from the bottomless greenish abyss below them.

It was as if the entire Lifestream exploded down below. A loud, thunder-like boom was heard below, and something rocketed skyward, way, way up from the chasm. Soon, Yuffie could see three forms, one kicking and presumably screaming, too, against the clear blue sky.

"INCOMING!" she yelled.

She cartwheeled far to the right, and next to her, an utterly exhausted Vincent dropped gracefully. He was down on one knee in shock for a moment, then looked up into Yuffie's wide-eyed face.

"That blast could have powered the Shinra mansion for a year, I'm sure," he said dryly.

Tifa looked up and saw the men in the air, too, catapulted upward by Barret's Lifestream-fueled blast. Seeing Cloud down on the ground, weary from his effort, she tried to drag him away from being square in the path of Barret's uncontrolled landing.

The only one not to clear out in time was Cid, and Barret landed hard on top of him with a _thud_!

Cid yelled more than a few unchoice words. "I got more bones broken by YOU landin' on top of me than I did when I fought that frickin' Behemoth back there!"

"Sorry, man," said Barret as he scratched the back of his head.

Phil landed hard on Barret, and once again, it made Cid swear so badly, the grass around him looked a shade browner than before he had opened his mouth. The guys began untangling themselves from their undignified mass on the ground.

"What was that green stuff?" desperately asked Phil when he was back on his feet. "What that the Lifestream I've heard about?"

Barret untangled himself and stood upright. "Yeah! That wuz your introduction to the spiritual side of the Planet!"

"It seemed to attach itself to you for a while there. Did it hurt?" asked Phil.

Barret laughed heartily. "Naw, man. Actually, it kinda...tickled!" He grinned, and his pure white teeth shone against his rustic ebony complexion.

Everyone greeted one another merrily, and they all informed one another of their various situations, and most especially, their relief that it was all over.

The five of them turned toward Tifa and Cloud. Cloud was holding his head, looking much better now, and sitting on the ground softly talking to Tifa.

They all went over to the couple, and stood by them, listening.

"Aeris brought me back! Look, the ring is for the both of us!" she said, removing her glove, and flashing Cloud the ring he had given her so long ago.

Cloud looked in her ruby eyes. "I'm surprised you still want to wear it...after all-"

"After all, all that matters is that we're together." She put her glove back on. "I...really want to keep the ring on. And I want everything else on, too."

Cloud smiled. He thought about all his doubts, and questions, and crises in the past few days. What did it matter if they just met yesterday, or as small children? They were always of one mind, and that's what mattered. Cloud had found his answers he so desperately needed, in the woman he still desperately loved. His soul's desire.

He bashfully played with his glove. "Everything can stay on, if you'll forgive me."

"Cloud..." Tifa grabbed him hard by the shoulders, and gave him a deep, sweet kiss. A kiss rooted in the desire of her soul, and sweetened and deepened through the many years of knowing him.

She pulled him up by the arm, surrounded by the cheers of her friends. Off the lot of them went, back toward the village, with Cloud and Tifa's arms wrapped tightly around one another.


	34. Chapter 34Epilogue

**Authoress' notes:** Stick a fork in this fanfic, it's DONE. It only took me...wha...six plus years? Praise God almighty.

I want to thank everyone for sticking in there and waiting so long for the chapters to get done. (especially you, Kira! ;) It took so long, because when I started this fanfic, I was simply not emotionally mature enough to complete it in any short amount of time. (And, besides that, it's only fanfiction, I don't own the characters or make any money off this stuff, so it has to wait until the things I DO do for money fall into place! HA!) You learn, as you write, what you're mature enough to write about, and what you're not quite ready to write about yet.

Basically, I want my stories and writing to be GOOD. If even I, myself, am to get any satisfaction in using these fantastic characters and the beautiful worlds they exist in, I don't want to throw just anything out there. So the stories brew in my head and roll around in there until I am pleased with what I'm about to write. I would not have been able to wrte this ending six years ago. Sometimes, as it was the case with this story, I get REALLY stuck and I'm infinitely glad I don't work with a publisher and have deadlines with this crap.

And I've learned a LOT. I learned I cannot write romance, I thoroughly do NOT enjoy it, and I think I rather suck at it. I LOOOOOVE writing battle scenes! Woohoo, gimme a battle and I'll write about it...especially one-on-one spars! My Bankotsu stories on fanfiction dot net are a TOTAL trip in that regard.

I've also learned that "it's" is a contraction of "it is" and "its" is possessive. I've learned where to use each form. It was annoying going back and correcting all of it. But it was a fun ride. Please check out my other stories, which someday (hur, hur, hur!) will be mirrored here. I hope my Bankotsu story doesn't take this long to write!

So here you go, this is the FINAL chapter in Souls' Desire. On with the show. *sniff*

Chapter 34 - Epilogue.

Yuffie breathed in the beautiful, salty sea air. _What a perfect day to kick off an outside celebration!_ she thought. She cleared her throat, and adjusted her kimono. _OK, maybe Dad wouldn't have minded the fishnet stocking so much if I kept it covered in this traditional gear!_

Going up the steps to the microphone, she adjusted the legs to be juuuust a little looser. The fishnet could now be clearly seen. _ I've shaped up a lot here, but that doesn't mean I'm going to be a boring traditionalist overnight! _ she thought, frowning intensely.

She stepped up to the podium, and behind her, was a huge easel, the picture that rested on it concealed with a bright pink cloth. She turned her head upwards, and there on the balcony of a near building, was a figure cloaked in dark blue. A little girl sat on a soft chair next to him, her chin resting in her folded arms, but her eyes were intensely focused on what was going on below.

Marlene flashed a "thumbs-up" to Yuffie. Vincent nodded at her, and Yuffie returned the gestures.

She hooked her short, dark hair behind her ears. Craning the mike down to her mouth, Yuffie began to speak.

"My people of Wutai. It brings me great pleasure to see you all gathered here on this lovely afternoon! The weather's cool, the sun is bright, and just think! We have only a few more months until the first day of winter here!"

Cloud, who was seated in a vast audience at Yuffie's far right, turned his mouth down wryly. In the second seat from the aisle, Tifa giggled. A few groans could be heard in the audience behind them.

"That's not the joke I told her to start off with," whispered a very annoyed Marlene to Vincent.

In the audience, next to Tifa, Cid bounced his leg up and down. He turned to the chair behind him, and gave his best student, Phil, a "thumbs-up". Phil returned the signal, complete with his usual, stupid, nervous grin, and continued to watch Yuffie. He was grateful that his teacher had given him a short reprieve from putting the _Highwind_ back together, piece-by-painful-piece.

At Cid's feet, everyone noticed, was what seemed to be a delicate-looking package. It was a basket which contained a gently wrapped, rounded *something* in yellow silk. Cid was antsy for these formal affairs to end and get out of the crowd to have a ciggie, go home and change into his pilot's gear, and give Shera, seated to his right, a peck on the cheek. Or maybe more.

Shera nudged Barret gently in the ribs as Yuffie began speaking, as she was warned she might have had to do. Barret grunted and woke up, then nailed his attention formly on Yuffie on the stage in front of him.

Seeing her joke didn't pan well with the audience, she flushed bright red. "Sorry, folks. I'm getting a handle on this responsibility of looking after all of you." She shook her head apologetically. "Seriously. Myself, and _those_ people in the front of the audience here," she said, pointing at Cloud's unusually well-dressed crew, "care for this planet. Some of us have had to learn what that really means, and a lot of us have lost important things on the way," She cleared her throat before adding, "and some of us have had to learn things the hardest way possible." She paused for a thoughtful moment.

"And I want to share with all of you what I've learned, what you can learn from me, and what my plans are for Wutai and for the planet."

"I have always dreamed, as some of you know, of making Wutai into 'Materia Central'. I wanted to use the extensive magical history of this place as a basis to make Wutai a vast, powerful place on the Planet. However, Wutai continues to be a home for travelers and tourists."

"And I was concerned. I was really worried that we would lose our identity as a people. My experiences in the past year or so has taught me that anything could happen at any given time. Anything could be lost. Anything could be taken away." She hung her head.

A short pause again, and she soon gathered more strength to direct her gaze into her audience again. "All these people that pass in and out of Wutai...could have been taken away, due to the actions of a few madmen who didn't have plans, I confess now to all of you, that were all that different from my own. Therefore, I now welcome the idea of travel and tourism into Wutai. Because you never know how long of a day 'the other guy' has had...and he could just use a comfy place to rest his head when he's done battling or the day. I want Wutai to be a place of power, in that it will be a place of renewal. A resting place for those who need it."

Barret leaned over towards Shera while Yuffie continued to speak. "Hey," he said softly to the Captain and his girlfriend. "She went and did a total 180, huh? It's like a totally different person's up there yakkin'!"

Shera returned her gaze toward Yuffie, and answered with a rather maternal tone. "I always knew she could do it. She's so young. She knew so much, but had so much to learn."

"Ya don't do stupid things just 'cuz you're young and dumb," quietly chimed in Cid to the two of them. "You could be an old man and just as much of an idiot, too." Snapping his head back forward, he suddenly turned defensive. "Anyway. _This_ old man really wants a cig right now."

The audience continued to listen attentively to the young girl on the stage. Her plans for Wutai caused quite a stir in the audience, as they were shocked that anyone in the position of leadership would encourage their tourism-based economy so strongly. The common folk always thought of Wutai's ruling class as an outdated mob of thieving snobs, and due to Yuffie's genuine desire to see Wutai grow, there was hardly a dry eye in the audience at the end of her speech.

"And in closing," she said with a sniff, "I have been in consultation with the Mayor of Midgar, Cloud Strife, about a joint effort to raise a monument to Aeris Gainsborough, and all those who have been lost due to the tragic events of the previous year! I will give you a preview now of what we are planning!" She snapped her fingers, and Vincent above her pushed a button.

The cloth dropped away from the easel, and the picture revealed a beautiful rendered work of a pure white sculpture, of a young girl with a long braid and a peasant's dress. In her hands she was presenting a greenish-white stone with graceful outstretched arms, and her hair and dress blowing backwards in an eternal strong wind captured in stone. Each fold and hair on her head would be an elegant work in the white material. Surround the central figure of Aeris, were various villagers displaying tools of various occupations, some portrayed as ready to fight alongside her, and some cheering her on.

The audience rose to its feet, and applauded for quite a long time. Yuffie dismissed them all with her own version of a blessing, sending them to the fair she and Vincent had set up prior to her speech. Cid finally left the vicinity of the temporary stage with a few grunts about finally getting to take a drag or two. He had to backtrack a couple steps to his chair when Shera reminded him to take the basket at his feet with him.

Cloud, Tifa, Cid, Shera, and Barret formed a circle around Cid as he puffed away at his cigarette, the strange basket still now at his feet.

Shera spoke first. "I think you were a bit too tough on Phil," she said. "You should make sure he gets enough vacation time. Putting the airship back together _and_ teaching classes full-time will get to him after a while."

Cid waved a hand at her. "The kid's fine. He's got plenty to make up for, for, you know, crashin' the _Highwind_ and everything." His expression softened, and he resumed after taking a long drag. "He'll be gettin' plenty of money from teaching flight classes, so whenever he wants a week or two off, he'll be set for it. He can go whenever he wants. I doubt it'll be anytime soon, though, as he's turnin' out to be quite an overachiever!"

"Like teacher, like student...sometimes!" laughed Barret. Cid shot him a peeved look.

Barret turned toward Cid. "Whatcha got in the basket, Cid? You got a new berry-pickin' hobby we don't know 'bout?"

Cid released a cloud of smoke, and Tifa, next to him, could have sworn she was right back fighting a rogue Malboro all over again. She waved the smoke away. Her time away from constantly being in a bar really sensitized her to the stuff.

"Sorry," said Cid, and moved out of being downwind from Tifa. He tightened his mouth. "This...this is part of a deal I had with Sunrise."

The rest of the crew looked at each other in turn, puzzled.

Yuffie approached them now, leading Sunrise by a jewel-studded harness. She greeted everyone gracefully, then gave Sunrise a pat on the back.

To everyone's surprise, Sunrise walked up to Cid, and nuzzled him lovingly!

"Oh, yeah, now that I'm in the process of spoiling your kids ROTTEN, you like me!" snapped Cid. Sunrise cooed in approval. Yuffie could have sworn the bird winked mischieviously at her.

"What's going on, Cid? Sunrise never really regarded you as one of her favorite humans!" asked Tifa.

Cid reached up and hesitatingly patted Sunrise on the head. "That's part of our deal. Sunrise has at least three young chicks back at the ranch, and that's not including this egg here," he pointed down at the basket at his feet with the hand holding the ciggie, "and starting today, I'm supposed to wait on all of 'em hand and foot. Um...you know...watch 'em when they're playin' so they don't get into trouble, take 'em on airships to have a sense of flyin', because you know chocobos don't fly...watch this egg until it hatches...that kinda crap."

Everyone was stunned at this news.

Tifa turned excitedly to Cloud. "We should hold a private celebration at our place after all this to congratulate Cid on his brood!"

Everyone laughed heartily, except Cid, who continued to smoke. His face was beet red, and he glanced at the golden chocobo next to him.

"You drive a hard bargain, lady."

The chocobo whistled merrily and hopped from foot to foot, dancing from joy.

THE END!

FINAL NOTE: Long Live Final Fantasy VII, the BEST video game ever made by human hands. :) Go and read some better, more current fanfic now, LOL


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